


Nine Bees

by ProphecyGirl



Series: Clexa Week 2020 [3]
Category: The 100 (TV), clexa - Fandom
Genre: #HeadForHeda2k20, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Summer Camp, Angst, Anxiety, Budding Romance, Clexa, Clexa Week, Clexa Week 2020, Clexaweek2020, Day 4: Roommates, Edging, Endgame Clarke Griffin/Lexa, Eventual Happy Ending, F/F, First Kiss, Fluff, Gaybies, Growing Up, Growing Up Together, Loss of Parent(s), Mild Hurt/Comfort, Minor Character Death, Oral Sex, Orgasm Denial, Roommates, Slow Burn, Slow Burn Clarke Griffin/Lexa, Smut, Soulmates Clarke Griffin/Lexa, Summer Camp, Teen Angst, Teen Romance, The 90s, Vaginal Fingering, Young Clarke, all smut is adult and consensual, clexa week day 4, from childhood friends to totally wifed, my kink is clexa holding hands during sex, time adjustment, young Raven Reyes, young lexa
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-12
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:15:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 21,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23094667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProphecyGirl/pseuds/ProphecyGirl
Summary: Clarke and Lexa meet, and meet again.The Summer Camp AU nobody asked for ~ Written for Clexa Week 2020 Day 4: Roommates ~ All edits done by me. ~ Mood Soundtrack on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/13kYS6u15yThaxU4KnXmwA?si=PVIT9oh6Sz-1_mnYCFd_BQ"Hi, I'm Lexa.”The girl had long, golden brown hair that was full of flyaways and snarls. It framed sparkling emerald green eyes and a narrow nose, which ended in a slightly upturned, rounded tip. She was missing two teeth; one on either side of her two front ones, giving her a rabbit-like appearance. She smiled with two blushing cheeks and her tongue tucked against her remaining front teeth as she held her hand out proudly. "You must be Clarke."
Relationships: Clarke Griffin/Lexa, Clexa - Relationship
Series: Clexa Week 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1656118
Comments: 18
Kudos: 191
Collections: Clexaweek2020





	1. Friends Forever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for Clexa Week 2020, Day 4: Roommates
> 
> I meant this to be a one shot. Oops.  
> ETA: I also thought each of my Clexaweek fics would be like, 3-4k apiece, tops. Really Big Oops (for me, let's hope you guys don't think so!)

Oh, take me back to the days  
We were dancing in the streets going insane  
We had no money, had no name  
But I knew that you and I would never change  
Oh, take me back into the streets  
Where I met the cutest girl I've ever seen  
We fell in love at seventeen  
And got my heart broken when she had to leave  
Do you remember when we used to be  
Them happy kids, them happy kids?  
When we were better, but in our memories  
We are happy kids, them happy kids  
Do you remember?

\- John de Sohn, “Happy Kids”

**Camp Trigedakru, Cabin 9B, June 1999**

"Hi, I'm Lexa.”

The girl had long, golden brown hair that was full of flyaways and snarls. It framed sparkling emerald green eyes and a narrow nose, which ended in a slightly upturned, rounded tip. She was missing two teeth; one on either side of her two front ones, giving her a rabbit-like appearance. She smiled with two blushing cheeks and her tongue tucked against her remaining front teeth as she held her hand out proudly.

“You must be Clarke. You’re the last one to get here. Everyone else got here yesterday,” she continued, her unanswered arm still hanging in midair. The other 9B’s hoped you were a ‘he’, cause of your name. But they’re all boy crazy now.”

Blinking in confusion, with her arms full of spotless new bags, Clarke struggled to hang onto her belongings as she reached back for Lexa's hand. Instead, she grabbed her forearm, and Clarke giggled nervously. Nonplussed, Lexa gave her forearm a solid shake, and then let go to catch a large _Caboodles_ makeup tote as it toppled from Clarke's pile.

"Nice catch. Yeah, I’m Clarke, I’m always late everywhere, even when I’m trying not to be.” She shrugged, the ponytails on either side of her head bouncing lightly on her shoulders. “Boys are the worst, my best friend Octavia has a brother, and he’s gross. His room smells like old cheese fries and indoor gym class. Who are the nine bees?"

“Oh, our bunkmates. Nine year olds, and then we’re cabin B. Means we're all turning ten soon, cabin A is all new nines. Is this your first time here? I don’t remember you from last year, and I remember everything. It’s my second year here, so if you need help finding things, you can always ask me.”

Clarke followed behind the talkative girl, her eyes sweeping across the cabin she would be calling home for the rest of the summer. Lexa stopped before a bunk bed that was empty on top; the lower bed was meticulously made-up and topped with what looked like a hand-knitted quilt. It bore an infinity loop in a bright shade of blue, etched into a carefully shaded grey stone, with neatly curved lettering that said, ' _Jus drein , jus daun_.'

"That's really pretty. What does that mean?"

Lexa beamed with pride, pointing to the infinity symbol. "This means forever, and it's printed on a traditional grave marker of our clan, Trikru clan. Because death is not the end, cause our spirits are eternal."

Clarke's eyes widened, and her voice was near reverent when she whispered, "Wow.."

Lexa straightened her posture, her chin tilting slightly. " _Jus drein jus daun_ is our clan’s language. When the Skypeople first landed, they killed a lot of us, and we said, ‘blood must have blood!’ But it’s different now. Now it means, people died so we could.. um, put all our blood into hard work.. Or, uh--into making everyone proud, if you—um.. Well, I'm not that far ahead in my _Natblida_ Studies class yet, but it means something nicer now," Lexa finished in a rush, looking mildly embarrassed; but her fumbling didn’t seem to disrupt the look of awe on Clarke’s face in the least.

"Wow," Clarke breathed once more, nothing short of entranced by Lexa's story as she gently fingered the soft, worn cloth of the blanket. "You're really Trikru? Like, the founders of Trigedakru Township?"

"Yes. My ancestor was the Commander who forged the first peace with the Skypeople and began the Reconstruction Era. I was named after her." Lexa was positively beaming with happiness.

Clarke offhandedly wondered whether Lexa had had much of a chance to tell anyone about her family before now. Lexa spoke and carried the same weight in her shoulders as Octavia had when she'd joined Clarke's class. There was a loneliness, a sort of desperation for companionship. She and Raven had rid Octavia of it at their first slumber party together--Octavia's first one overall--and Clarke decided then and there to help Lexa do the same. She was already fond of the strange girl, with her overly formal gestures and constant cascade of chattering.

"That's so, so cool! I wonder if she knew any of my ancestors. Mine were Skypeople--" Clarke hurried to continue, not wanting Lexa to think badly of her. "But the good kind.. I think." She would have to remember to ask her parents about that, and then maybe say she was sorry to all of her Grounder friends, if they were the bad Skypeople.

"It's okay, we're all Grounders now, right? I put my stuff on the bottom bunk, but I can move it, if you’re scared of heights or something,” Lexa offered to an increasingly overwhelmed Clarke, her pleasant smile still in place.

“Um, no. No, thank you, I’m not scared of heights, the top bunk is fine,” Clarke replied, dropping her bags on the floor beside the bunk. “Makes it easier to bug you, anyway. Where is everyone else?”

“Oh, you'll never bug me, Clarke," Lexa said cheerfully, setting the Caboodles case on Clarke’s bed and sitting beside it. “There’s an ice cream social, for campers to get to know each other before camp _really_ starts.”

Clarke opened her backpack and unceremoniously spilled its contents out on the floor and began to paw through it, while Lexa watched from her spot on her bunk.

“How come you aren’t there?”

Lexa picked at the crumbling puffy paint on her sneakers—a half-lopsided chain of tiny flowers in various colors, joined together with a disintegrating line of green stems—and shrugged a little. “I don’t really like ice cream. Besides, I volunteered to be Cabin Greeter, cause I didn't want you to be alone on your first day."

“Really? That was really nice. But, Lexa?” Clarke looked up from the pile on the floor in shock. “How can you not like _ice cream_?” The concept was unimaginable, really.

Lexa just shrugged noncommittally once more, before sliding off the bed. Suddenly, her face began brightening quickly.

"Hey! Do you like horses? The stables are just through the woods."

Clarke's face had lit up at the mention of horses, but now she looked dubious, as she squatted amidst her belongings. "The woods? Are we allowed? My mom will be _really_ upset if I get in trouble the first day."

Lexa shifted a bit, leaning on the corner post of their bunk. "Well, we’re not _really_ allowed, but I go there a lot. Especially when I’m sad, you know. Homesick. Nobody's usually there if the trail isn't booked."

“Not even the other kids?” Clarke’s bright blue eyes twinkled mischievously, and the tip of her tongue peeked our between the corners of her lips, making it very clear that she was close to being swayed. Lexa shook her head, not wanting to push her new friend.

"Yes," Clarke cried as she plucked a men's watch from her pile with a triumphant grin. She stood, strapping the watch on and sliding the closure pin into a makeshift hole closer to the watch face. The additional hole was perfectly sized to her slim wrist, despite the overly wide face capped by a thick, slightly frayed band.

"This is my dad's," Clarke explained, stepping alternately over and around the pile of debris she'd left on the floor, walking closer to Lexa. She held her arm out proudly as Lexa inspected the fancy watch, clearly impressed. "Anytime we have to be away from each other, he hides it in my stuff and I get to wear it. He calls me a slowpoke, and says that's why we're always late to school. He never gets mad at me for it, though. But if I have his watch, I'll know when it's time to go home, so I won't be late to meet him."

Lexa was clearly impressed by both Clarkes grown-up watch, and the story behind it. "That's really cool, _Klark_." She pronounced the 'k' with a hard click behind it, her tongue furling slightly into the gap in her front teeth as she did. It was strange, but Clarke liked it; it made her feel like Lexa thought she was cool, or special in some way, which felt nice, even if it was just her missing teeth. "I have this, from my moms."

She held up a thin silver strand for Clarke, who leaned closer with intrigue and awe. "Are those real dog tags?"

Lexa nodded solemnly, her chin tilting up proudly. "My moms are Marines. They serve proudly in first battalion, second marines, Timberwolves! Oorah!" She barked the end and stood in a full salute, complete with heels clicked together, which just impressed Clarke even more.

"Do they go away at the same time? Are they fighters? Who takes care of you when they go away, or can they bring you with them?” Clarke's face was heavily concerned as she draped herself upside down across the lower bunk, pulling a bag of Twizzlers from her floor pile and offering it to Lexa first, who took one happily.

"Thank you. Sometimes they go away together," she said, taking a bite of the licorice. "And then my sister Anya and I stay with our Uncle Titus. But we don't like him very much. He's cranky, and his head is all shaved and has scary tattoos all over it. And he won’t let us watch Cartoon Network, even though we’re allowed to at home.”

Clarke made a face, tearing into three Twizzlers at once before speaking around her mouthful of food.

“Oh, that stinks. I would hate it if my mom and dad left all the time. Both of them? A girl could go ka _-razy_ like that! I don’t even want to get married, cause what if my partner didn’t want to be around my mom and dad all the time? I would _definitely_ go completely crazy, and cry myself to _death_ ,” she declared dramatically, resting the back of her hand against her forehead as though she felt faint at the very idea. “Don’t you miss them like crazy?"

“‘Course I miss them, but..” Lexa shrugged, glaring at the offending candy in her hand as she pulled it free from where it had become stuck in her tooth gap. "They're serving their country, so other kids' moms can take them to school and tuck them in, too. There's kids that don't ever get tucked in, you know," she added wisely, poking at her gum briefly with a fingertip.

Clarke's eyes widened slightly. "My daddy always tucks me in. It's the best part of my whole day, I have nightmares if he doesn't."

Lexa bit her lip, conflicted for a moment. After a moment she admitted, "I lied to you. I'm sorry. I love ice cream, my favorite is mint chocolate chip. I just.. don't like going to the canteen, really, and you have to stay there if you get ice cream. And.. I, uh.. I don't have really any friends here."

Her face filled with shame, and she slumped a little, like she expected Clarke to yell and leave. She probably did, Clarke thought.

"Sure you do, dummy. You've got me." Lexas head shot up, her face brightening quickly. With that, Clarke tumbled off the bed, trod over her discarded belongings again, and paused only to face Lexa and put her hand on her hip.

"Well? Are you coming, or not?"

Lexa slowly oozed off the bunk, confusion on her face. "Where?"

Clarke gave her a wicked grin and spun on her heel. "To steal ice cream and visit some horses, dummy."

For some reason, though, when Clarke called her _dummy_ , it felt affectionate; special, and Lexa's face broke into a wide smile as she ran after her new friend.

"How are we gonna _steal_ ice cream?" Lexa asked in a hushed tone, her stomach fluttering with excitement.

Clarke waved her hand dismissively. "Piece of cake."

"I like pie better."

"Piece of pie, then. Piece of cake, piece of pie."

They giggled as they ran across the campground, with Lexa naturally taking the lead by virtue of knowing where they were going.

They'd just entered the field the canteen lay in, when from behind them, a voice shouted, "Griff! Gryffindor!"

Clarke skidded to a stop, and Lexa had to backtrack a few steps; a feat she did so slowly. Clarke broke out in a huge grin and screamed, "Raven!"

A beautiful girl with dark hair and eyes joined them, still running in place as she and Clarke shrieked a bit more and hugged.

"I thought your mom said you couldn't come!" Clarke gasped, holding the sleeve of Raven's hoodie in her hands as she bounced on her toes. Raven stopped jogging in place, but remained in constant motion, her body vibrating with nervous energy as she took in a deep breath before letting her words spill out.

"She did! But then she started dating this guy, and he has money, you know, like lots of it. And so _he_ said they could get rid of the little shit—that’s me,” she added briefly to Lexa, who looked horrified “—for the whole summer, and then she said, well how am I supposed to afford it when she needs new shoes before school starts. And then _he_ said that we could get shoes from the thrift store until I stop outgrowing ‘em. And then _she_ said that it wasn’t up to him to say where she went to buy shoes. And then they had a _huge_ , h _uge_ fight!”

Raven clapped her hands together, making a long and loud exploding sound with her mouth. “Like _so_ huge! And they threw stuff around, and then _she_ started crying, and he said he just wanted to do something nice with her, so why didn't she let him pay for me to go away to camp, so they can go have sex on the beach and get whatever an _inflagrante_ _delicto_ is. I think it’s like, a kind of lasagna or something.”

Lexa blinked, taken aback as she lingered just slightly behind Clarke, her hands linked together behind her back as she stood stiffly. Clarke, however, acted as though this was all perfectly normal behavior, and just hopped forward, sharing with Raven another excited embrace, complete with shrieking.

Lexa shifted uncomfortably. “It means.. when people.. _have sex_ ,” she finished in a whisper, her cheeks reddening.

Raven leaned around Clarke to look at Lexa, Clarke’s head turning towards her as well. “What does?”

“ _Inflagrante delicto_ ,” Lexa replied, picking at a loose thread on the pocket of her overalls. “I like to read the dictionary when I’m bored,” she offered by way of explanation.

Raven and Clarke shared a strange, communicatory look with one another, and Lexa poked the toe of her shoe into the dirt awkwardly, her eyes focused on some distant location. Raven pulled a wax soda bottle candy from her cargo pocket and bit the cap of it off, her eyes on Lexa as she took it back in one shot.

“I’m Raven. It’s good to know I’m not the only genius in a camp full of morons,” Raven offered in response, tossing a second wax bottle to Lexa, who caught it with a look of surprised confusion on her face.

"Hey!" Clarke gasped in mock offense, putting her hand over her heart as Lexa slowly smiled. She angled the wax bottle to fit under her remaining teeth and struggled only briefly before ripping the cap of it off.

“I’m Lexa,” she held out her hand as she had done with Clarke; an overly formal gesture that now made more sense, considering her family’s involvement in the military. She swallowed the sweet liquid inside the bottle in one shot as Raven slapped her hand in an unexpected—for Lexa's part anyway—high five.

“You’re pretty cool, Lexa. What other dirty words do you know?” Raven prodded, handing Clarke a wax bottle as well.

“Well—“ Lexa began, her cheeks flushing at the compliment. “I like the word, _merde_. It means.. the s-word, but in French. A-and, in England, they say ‘bloody’ and it means, uh.. the F - word.”

Clarke looked scandalized, but in clear awe, and Raven laughed loudly, slapping her knee as her ponytail bobbed with her fit. “Bloody. I like this one more than Octavia, Griffin. Can we bloody keep her?"

Lexa blushed, and Clarke grinned, her tone nearly bragging; like she was proud that she had discovered Lexa first. "She also knows where the horses are, and a secret way through the woods to them, too."

“A brainy troublemaker who knows where they keep the horses? It's official, Lexa is the fourth musketeer. Cause I guess we still have to let Octavia be in the club, even though she's a loser who's going to Montauk for the summer. Instead of to camp, like the cool kids."

"You're just jealous she gets to go to the beach," Clarke informed her.

“Of course I am, it’s the _beach_ and I hate Octavia now _._ Come on losers, let's go get some of that ice cream I heard about, before the big kids eat it all," Raven demanded, turning and starting towards the canteen pavilion unceremoniously. Clarke shrugged as she started walking after Raven backwards. "She's crazy, but she's a good friend. Come on, Sir Lexa."

Lexa smiled widely, taking off after the girls with a happy bounce in her step; particularly when Clarke grabbed her hand and they ran together to catch up to Raven.

♾

Later that night, when they sat around the bonfire singing and clapping along to a fireside song, Clarke, Lexa, and Raven sat clustered together on a narrow log. Occasionally they joined in the cheerful singing, as they shared what seemed to be an endless supply of contraband candy in both Clarke and Raven’s pockets.

“I haven’t even met my bunkmates yet,” Raven announced to them, trying to crack a jawbreaker in her mouth unsuccessfully. “I hope they don’t suck.”

“What cabin are you in?” Clarke asked around a mouthful of Skittles.

“Eleven B,” Raven mumbled around the giant sugar ball in her mouth.

“Hey, you’re our new bunkmate?” Came a voice from behind them. A short girl with jet black hair and a seemingly permanent scowl on her face stood with her arms crossed next to a blonde girl with a clearly forced pleasant smile, who was speaking. “I’m Nia. This is Ontari. You should come sit with us, instead of these babies, then.”

Clarke bristled, and Lexa ducked her head slightly. Raven looked to the newcomers coolly, spitting the jawbreaker into her hand messily. “I’m actually happy right here, thanks. Want some candy?” She held the sodden candy out to them with a pleasant smile that almost perfectly matched Nia’s, and the other girls recoiled in horror.

“Ew! What a freak!” Ontari hissed, backing away as though Raven’s freak-status might carry with it the risk of contagion.

"They do suck. Too bad," Raven sighed and waved with a sweet smile at the girls as they left. Clarke was chuckling, but Lexa looked scandalized.

“They’re your bunkmates, don’t you want to try to get along with them? You have to spend the whole summer with them,” Lexa pointed out.

Raven scoffed and turned back around on the log, stuffing the jawbreaker back into her mouth. “I’m just sleeping near them. I'm spending the whole summer with my friends, not those brainless Barbie dolls.”

“Friends forever,” Clarke said, folding her hand into a fist and pressing it to Raven’s folded fist before both of them looked up at Lexa expectantly.

Lexa felt a smile beginning to spread over her cheeks. Raven had called her _friend_.

“Friends forever,” Lexa parroted, pressing her own fist in with Clarke and Raven’s, before miming a three-person explosion in the center of them before falling into a fit of giggles.


	2. Growing Pain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Some discussion of puberty & body issues, including a scene of bullies body shaming, because kids are the actual worst.

I had a dream, it blows the autumn through my head   
It felt like the first day of school but I was going to the moon instead   
We walked out on the dark and frozen grass   
The end of the summer, it’s the end of the summer   
When you send your children to the moon  
The summer ends and we wonder who we are   
\- Dar Williams, “The End of Summer”

**Camp Trigedakru, Cabin 12B, June 2002**

“Hey, Lexa, let’s go!”

“Yeah, come on, sexy Lexa! Let’s see what you’ve got under that gross shirt,” Nia called out, whooping from the grass where she and Ontari were reclined in bikinis, tanning.

Nia had spent the previous school year having some sort of weirdly accelerated puberty, apparently. Seemingly overnight, she’d sprouted all the assets that many of the other girls spent day and night wishing they too would—or wouldn’t. It had quickly become she and Ontari’s goal for the summer to humiliate anyone who wasn’t quite up to their level of adulthood yet, and so they were currently cat-calling Lexa from the shore.

Lexa stood on the end of the dock in an oversized, tattered Marines shirt, feeling an inch tall. Truthfully, she wanted to run; pull her mom's shirt tighter around herself and disappear from the cruel laughter that seemed to surround her.

"Nice boobs, Nia. Maybe you can grow a brain next," Clarke shot off at her.

Lexa whirled at the sound of her voice, her face breaking into a wide smile when she saw Clarke walking down the dock in glittery neon pink flip-flops and an oversized tee shirt that reached her knees. She had heart-shaped sunglasses on and her pale streaked golden hair was tied up in a messy bun on top of her head, lilting just slightly off to the side.

“Clarke!” Lexa cried out, not even caring how childish the glee in her voice was.

“Sir Lexa the Valiant,” Clarke responded, making an overdramatic bow before her, her father’s watch flickering in the afternoon’s relentless sunbeams. “It’s my pleasure to see you again, milady.”

Lexa laughed, throwing her arms around the other girl, and Clarke returned the embrace as the sun beat down on them.

“You’re late, Gryffindor,” Lexa teased.

“I’m always late,” Clarke responded, dropping the mesh bag she carried with her to the dock.

“Aww, look. The Loser Twins are back together,” Ontari called sweetly from beside a ruffled-looking Nia. “What a sweet, sad little reunion.” Lexa looked mildly wounded, her stomach flipping inside as her emotions pressed against the inside of her chest.

“Don’t worry. I’ll shut them up,” Clarke assured her. She turned to face the older girls before she pulled her shirt off, dropping it on top of the spilled bag that still sat on the wooden planks of the short dock.Nia and Ontari turned red, looking quite mollified, and it took Lexa a moment to figure out why. She glanced to Clarke unsurely, her breath catching in her throat as she did.

Clarke had spent the summer growing up, too, and Lexa felt her cheeks growing rapidly red, and something in her chest fluttered a bit. Clarke had curves now; real curves, more pronounced in every sense than either Nia or Ontari could lay claim to, despite being older.

Lexa _should_ have been thinking about how best to respond to Clarke—her friend, her knight in glittering sandals—shutting the Mean Girls up. Instead, Lexa found herself blushing harder as she glanced out of her peripheral to see the rest of Clarke’s two-piece suit. She kicked her shorts aside, and Lexa swallowed hard. She watched nervously as Clarke applied her sunscreen, seemingly unaware that Lexa was entranced and staring. The other girls at school had been generating crushes for—it seemed—forever, by then; but Lexa herself had never felt so much as the slightest interest in anyone she knew, to the point of wondering if she was just broken.

Until now, anyway.

Clarke glanced sideways at her, giving her a playful grin that made Lexa’s heart stutter in place. “Come on, Sir Lexa. Let’s show these jerks how a bee celebrates summer.” Clarke grabbed her shirt from her pile and pulled it back on.

Without another word, Clarke pushed Lexa unceremoniously into the lake; tee shirt and all. Lexa gasped and sputtered as she reached the surface quickly and gazed up at Clarke with hurt in her eyes. Clarke, however, didn’t catch it, because she was too busy sailing into the water beside Lexa, her shirt still in place.

When Clarke’s head pierced the surface, and she’d taken in a breath or two, she called out to Ontari and Nia—who were busy packing up their tanning supplies, apparently put into their place by Clarke’s superior pubescent achievement.

“Skin cancer is no joke,” she informed them, tugging at the shoulder of her shirt. “You won’t think you’re so hot when your face looks like bits of old leather. Nobody’s gonna wanna marry _that_.”

The girls both looked horrified, and Lexa sputtered her laughter into the water, feeling oddly safe as her mom’s old shirt floated in the water, surrounding her like a bubble.

“Bitches,” Clarke muttered under her breath as they huffed away, their heads pressed together as they, no doubt, began plotting their revenge.

“Thanks, Clarke,” Lexa finally offered softly as the girls fell out of sight. “You didn’t have to cover up just to make me fee—“

Clarke twirled in the water before kicking her feet up to float on her back. “I always wear a shirt in the water. Did you know you have a better chance of getting sunburn in the water, than out of it? Especially when you think the sky is too overcast for the sun, that’s when it gets you. I’d rather look like a nerd than a lobster.” Lexa merely raised an eyebrow, and Clarke shrugged. “My mom’s a doctor. Before I left, I got a three hour study session on the effects of skin cancer, and a bottle of an SPF so high that when you squeeze it, a sweater pops out.”

Lexa laughed, her cheeks turning red. “I’m so happy you’re here, Clarke. I thought you weren’t coming.”

“I got the days mixed up, when camp started,” Clarke shrugged, looking surprisingly sedate. “Then, cause we were obviously super late, my dad and I got into an argument on our way here. He just kept, like—“ Clarke took on a masculine, scolding tone. “You’re nearly thirteen, Clarke and I want you to start taking some responsibility for yourself now, blah blah blah. And I said he’s the adult, and it’s his job to figure out what day camp started, not mine. And then we didn’t talk the rest of the way here. Or stop for iHop like he promised."

“I’m sorry, Clarke.” Lexa’s face softened, and she instinctively reached out in the water to touch her shoulder comfortingly.

Clarke, however, shrugged it off and proceeded to do a backflip underwater. She popped up a foot or so away from where she’d been—from Lexa—and waved to her to follow, which Lexa, of course, did without question; though there was an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of her stomach that she couldn’t quite shake.

“Where are we going?” Lexa asked, though she had a good idea.

“Musketeer meeting,” Clarke replied, climbing up the side of the dock and stuffing her belongings into her bag once more.

♾

"I can't believe we can just come here and do this anytime we want," Clarke mumbled into the soft muzzle of a grey quarter horse, who snuffled lightly in response.

"I love them," Lexa replied dreamily, feeding a brownquarter horse some carrot hunks. "That's why I came to this camp in the first place. I learned how to ride my first year, and then my moms let me take lessons ever since.

"Do you have your own horse?" Clarke asked, her eyes widening as she chewed on a sugar cube that had been meant for the horse.

"No. I ride this beautiful thoroughbred named Cherokee, but she belongs to the stable. I want one, someday." Lexa sighed, scratching the horse's neck lovingly and laying her head affectionately against the gentle beast."Can’t I just stay here the rest of camp? Who needs people when there's horses?"

Clarke nodded her agreement before turning her head to let out a sneeze. “I’ve only wanted a horse since birth. But my parents made me take art lessons instead.”

“Allergic?” Lexa asked, sitting in a pile of hay and searching her drawstring backpack and triumphantly pulling out a large ziplock bag, crammed with candies and offering it to Clarke.

“Oooh,” Clarke abandoned the horse in favor of collapsing into the hay pile beside Lexa. “And yeah, we found out over Christmas break.”

“Why did we come here, then? Your eyes and nose are already all red.”

Clarke shrugged and opened a package of Nerds, pouring some into her hand before offering the package to Lexa, who took it. “I dunno. It’s just our place.”

Lexa's heart fluttered as she watched Clarke quietly sort her Nerds into color-coded groups and, once she had done that, started eating the leftovers until she had the same number of candies in each pile. Odd, considering Clarke's habit of leaving a trail of chaotic mess in her wake, but endearing despite that. Lexa began to say something; maybe something about it being sweet that Clarke was willing to take loads of Benadryl just to hide out in the barn with her, or perhaps about how good her timing was on the docks; but then a voice boomed from the doorway.

“What are you kids doing here? Half the camp is looking for you,” the leader of the entire camp was standing there, his arms crossed and a disapproving look on his face as he looked directly at Lexa.

“Chancellor Kane?” Lexa squeaked as she sat up from the pile of hay she'd retreated to, and bits of straw remained stuck in her unruly hair; a few were even lodged under her headband, giving her the appearance of antennae. Clarke glanced at her, quickly scooting forward.

“It’s not Lexa’s fault, Chancellor. You see, I wanted to see the horses, cause we just found out I’m allergic, and my parents won’t let me around them, they wrote a note and all. So I tricked Lexa into coming with me, to be my lookout. You should punish me, not her.”

“That’s not true,” Lexa insisted. Clarke was already on the rocks with her father; Lexa could handle being in trouble. It would be her first time in trouble; her moms might actually be a little proud of her for stepping outside the line for once.

Kane, however, just looked at them oddly. “Uh, well, it’s nice to see you two bonding—especially to the point of trying to take the fall for one another. But we’re going to just.. consider this a warning. Nobody’s getting punished, but Miss Woods, I do need you to come with me. We have a phone call from home for you.”

Lexa studied their Chancellor unsurely; it wasn’t like him to be so forgiving, particularly this quickly. And a phone call from home? Was she really in _that_ much trouble?

“It has nothing to do with this,” Kane offered as the girls collected themselves. “It’s.. something else. Ms. Griffin, why don’t you take both of your things back to your bunk, and then join your friends at the crafting cabin?”

“Yes, sir,” Clarke said, but there was no sass in her voice, and she began to collect their stuff from the pile of hay, her worried eyes on Lexa as she dusted herself off and followed Kane out the door without another word, looking back only briefly at Clarke, her expression full of fear.

♾

Clarke was in full anxiety mode by the time she was finally able to escape back to their bunk. She ditched lunch and waited in the woods until the coast was clear. As she walked into the cabin, a dark pit began to fill her stomach.

Gone was Lexa’s handmade quilt with the infinity symbol, and her squishy pillow that looked like a bumblebee; the stack of friendship bracelets they and Raven had been making for four years together, her battered green backpack and the neat line of shoes that had resided under her bed. All of it was gone.

Clarke felt hollow and dazed and a little gone herself, as she sat on Lexa's bare bunk trying to work out what could have happened. Had they kicked Lexa out of camp for sneaking off to the stables? Was it a cruel prank from the Mean Girls? Take all of Lexa’s belongings and hide them somewhere? What if something horrible had happened?

Clarke let the impending sense of doom simmer, worrying about Lexa's sudden disappearance and lamenting Raven's scholarship to space camp for the summer. Without them, she was alone there.

Clarke had never been very good at being alone.

She'd really begun to spin out, and by the time her other bunkmates returned for cabin quiet time, she was curled in a ball on the empty bunk, playing with a tattered friendship bracelet that was nestled snugly against the side of her dad's watch. It was the first bracelet Lexa had made for her, their second week in 9B as they’d lounged hidden in the hayloft together.

The other girls whispered, and stared, and a few even asked her, but Clarke just waited, silent and solemn, for Lexa's (hopefully) inevitable return. It hadn't been long when Chancellor Kane knocked at the screen door of the cabin, eliciting a few shrieks from the others as he entered after their junior counselor gave permission. Clarke rolled over to look up at him, but stayed where she was on Lexa's bunk. The camp leader looked tired and sad, and the other girls went quiet quickly.

"I'm sorry to have to tell you all this, but Alexa Woods will not be returning to camp this summer. She's had a family emergency, and was called home today. I kno—“

“It’s Lexa, not _Alexa_ ,” Clarke corrected him bitterly, then sat bolt upright as the others began exchanging whispers. "What kind of emergency, can we talk to her?"

"You are, of course, free as always to make whatever phone calls you want during your call slot. That’s if your parents gave you quarters or a calling card, otherwise you’ll need to call collect if it isn’t an emergency. Miss Callie can help you in the office if you need it,” Kane replied, continuing smoothly. "I know everyone here will work very hard to have a good time this summer, despite this unfortunate occurrence. It’s what Miss Woods would want from all of you—to enjoy this gift of summer together. Not worry about her personal business.”

Kane nodded firmly, clearly finished, but Clarke stood to address him. "Can I please, please call her now? This _is_ an emergency, and I have a calling card. Please? I don't get phone time ’til Thursday. Also, I don't have her number.."

Kane cleared his throat. "I'm very sorry, Miss Griffin. Perhaps if you had been here on day one, you would have gotten a more optimal time slot for your phone calls. And we cannot give out campers' personal information to anyone without permission. If Miss Woods didn’t give her number to you, there’s nothing we can do.”

Clarke crossed her arms, her eyes growing stormy with fear and anger, her posture defensive as she replied stubbornly, “You could call her and get her permission. I know she would give her permission, I’m her _best friend_."

"I'm sorry, Miss Griffin. My hands are tied." Kane looked regretful, and surprisingly didn’t seem angry with Clarke’s attitude, but he remained unwaveringly firm, and the conversation was most definitely over at that point.

Clarke felt the world fall away, and later that night, she lay awake and restless in the bare bunk. She picked sadly at the frayed, faded hemp tied around her wrist, and let herself cry quietly into the thin, uncomfortable mattress as she faced an entire summer essentially alone; wondering when or even _if_ she’d ever see Lexa again.


	3. Forever This Way

Love be still, love be sweet  
Don’t you dare change a thing  
I want to photograph you with my mind  
To feel how I feel now all the time  
Say that you'll stay forever this way  
Forever and forever, that we'll never have to change  
Don’t move, don’t breathe, don’t change, don’t leave  
And promise me, say you'll stay, we’ll stay this way  
Don’t move, don’t breathe, don’t change, don’t leave  
Promise me we'll always be this kind, this sweet  
This good to me, promise me we'll always be  
\- Jewel, “This Way”

**Camp Trigedakru, Cabin 13B, June 2003**

“Lexa!” Clarke yelled excitedly, flinging herself through the doorway of Bunk 13B and slamming directly into a stunned Lexa. “Oh my _god_ , I missed you! What happened last summer?! Where did you go? I wanted to call you, but _Our Führer_ Kane wouldn’t give me your number, he’s such a fascist ass! I’m so glad to see you! Are you okay?”

Lexa had slimmed down significantly over the past year, and her hair was no longer wild and unruly. Rather, it was tied back in two neat braids that hung straight down her back. Her sneakers were new, but plain—none of the Sharpie drawings or puffed paint that had always graced her slightly clumsy feet.

She smiled when she saw Clarke, but there were storm clouds behind her deep green eyes and a hesitance in their shared embrace that felt unnatural and foreign. Clarke let go and stepped back, her eyes searching Lexa's curiously; worriedly.

“Um,” Lexa started, looking uncomfortable and very small inside a large maroon-colored hoodie that had ‘ _Semper Fidelis’_ emblazoned in yellow across the chest. "Th-there was a bombing, where my moms were stationed. And--um.."

Lexa's voice cracked, her lower lip quivering as she tried to steady herself. She couldn't get the words out, but Clarke's face fell quickly as she realized what Lexa was trying to say.

"Both of them?" She was horrified, heartbroken for Lexa.

To lose one parent, she thought, would be practically unsurvivable—to lose both at the same time? Clarke couldn’t imagine waking up the first day without them and still being able to breath herself.

No matter how much Clarke fought with them these days; how much farther away from her dad she had begun to feel lately. No matter how many late nights her mom worked, all the while swearing it was of world-saving importance this time when her beeper went off in the midst of dinner, or family game night, or the night Clarke's painting had been on display in a gallery.

It had been a real art gallery, too. Clarke had been selected as one of twenty-five incoming freshman high schoolers from across the country to have work featured in Polis Museum of Art; in their " _Gifted Artists of Tomorrow_ " exhibit. She and her artistic peers would be in the newspaper and even on the Polis news channels. But Dr. Abby Griffin had an emergency surgery beep through, and she hadn't even stepped out of their taxi at the gallery.

Double parked beside the Polis News van, a crowd had watched as she barely waved goodbye, already instructing the cabbie on exactly what streets to take to backtrack to the hospital. She definitely hadn't noticed the tears running down Clarke's cheeks, streaking tracks through the carefully applied makeup she'd been allowed to wear for her special evening; dripping onto the cerulean blue dress they were supposed to shop for together, but hadn’t.

Still. If she knew she’d never see her mother again, she’d have jumped into the cab after her without a second thought. Dragged her father with them by their clasped hands.

Lexa merely nodded after a long pause, looking everywhere but into Clarke's eyes.

"I'm so sorry, Lexa. I wanted to call you, but I didn't have your number, and--"

"It's okay, Clarke," Lexa interrupted gently. She gave her a sad smile and made her way into the bunk, passing Clarke quietly and heading for their old bed. Seeing Clarke's belongings dumped across the lower bunk, she had quietly begun making up the top bed by the time a disoriented Clarke followed her.

"I can move my stuff, I haven't even unpa--"

"It's alright, Clarke. I'm fine. Really."

Lexa said nothing else, and Clarke waited for her like a trained retriever, scratching at her wrist and shooting dirty looks at their whispering bunkmates until they were uncomfortable enough to leave. Lexa carefully smoothed the corners of her beige blanket down over the edge of the mattress as the other girls slowly filed out.

"What happened to your other blanket? With the Woods crest on it."

Lexa paused, her toes balanced carefully on the side of Clarke's new bed as she swallowed hard, her hand trembling slightly as it grabbed the upper bed rail to steady her. “My uncle said it was an important heirloom and shouldn't be taken where it'll get dirty or stolen."

Clarke watched the lanky, pale girl with the neat braids and the plain belongings, and felt something inside her shattering a little. Something had ended; and though Clarke couldn’t quite put a name to it, she felt its disappearance as solidly as she'd felt anything else. She knew it was something essential, something special, and that she would miss it. She knew it hurt; she wondered if it was childhood's death rattle as it had finally slipped from her fingers completely. The layers had been peeling away for years already, and Clarke felt suddenly raw, like the last layer had just been ripped off completely, but she'd yet to grow her protective adult skin. She was still soft and raw, red and crying from the pain of it. 

Lexa hung her simple grey backpack on the bedpost and pinned a scrap of newspaper onto the wall just beside it. She shrugged off the hoodie with the Marines' slogan on it and folded it before neatly tucking it under her pillow. She slid off the bed, already wearing her camp uniform, and gave Clarke a slightly uncomfortable smile.

“It’s nice to see you again, Clarke,” she said quietly, before walking past her and out the cabin’s screen door.

Clarke stood by the bed, feeling the telltale pinprick of burning tears forming behind her eyes. Lexa had acted like they barely knew each other. Like they hadn’t shared anything special, like they were just two people who went to camp together a few times. Wiping at her cheeks and feeling stupid for thinking Lexa had thought about her as much as she’d thought about Lexa, Clarke leaned into the clipping pinned to the wall, and read the slightly blurred text on the slightly rumpled page.

> **Spouses Lieutenant Colonel Indra Woods, 35,**
> 
> **and Sergeant Major Gus Woods, 33, both career**
> 
> **Marines of unincorporated Trigeda Township,**
> 
> **passed on Wednesday at Landstuhl Regional**
> 
> **Medical Center in Landstuhl, Germany, after their**
> 
> **convoy vehicle was targeted by an IED attack.**
> 
> **They are survived by their daughters, Lexa Woods**
> 
> **and Anya Woods, and Gus’ brother, Titus.**
> 
> **In lieu of flowers, the family has requested**
> 
> **donations to the Marine Corps. Scholarship**
> 
> **Foundation. Burial will be in a private ceremony.**

There was a photo attached of Lexa’s moms—both beautiful and beaming with love as they held their daughters—and Clarke straightened slowly, the tears coming from her eyes just a little bit faster as she sank onto the bed, feeling lost. Lexa clearly hadn’t thought as much of their friendship as Clarke had. She probably had a ton of friends back home that were actually _there_ for her through her pain. Of course she had no interest in Clarke anymore, and Clarke had to be completely stupid to even think—

Unless..

Clarke felt sure about it; it just had to be. She stood quickly, with a look of determination replacing the tears on her face as she took off out the bunk door and broke into a jog towards the woods.

When she got to the stable, as she had expected, Lexa was there. Her willowy figure was bent over a gate she was perched on, her arms around a grey Appaloosa as she cried softly into the mare’s fur. Clarke lingered in the doorway for a moment, unsure whether her presence was wanted once more and beginning to doubt herself.

“Lexa?” She called softly. Lexa startled and nearly fell off the gate, but recovered quickly and wiped at her eyes before carefully stepping off it.

“Clarke. What—uh, sorry. I was just—I was—“ Lexa’s hands flopped uselessly to her sides, gesticulating as her head lowered. “I don’t know.”

“It’s okay,” Clarke whispered, taking a tentative step closer. “I—I can get out of your face. It kinda.. seemed, back at the bunk, like..” Clarke dug her toe into the dirt floor, her fingers idly tugging at a large splinter in the barn’s doorway. “Maybe I was bugging you or something.”

"You'll never bug me, Clarke," Lexa moved closer and sank onto a tightly packed hay bale, looking tired and sad. “I’m sorry. I just.. This has been a really hard year, you know? And being back here, seeing you, even just seeing gentle old Gramsy here,” she gestured at the grey horse, named for her sweet nature and easygoing personality. “It’s like.. like it all just, was happening again or something.”

“I get it,” Clarke whispered, tentatively joining Lexa on the hay bale, but careful not to sit too close, just in case it made her uncomfortable. “My mom says anything can remind someone of a trauma. It’s always like, valid, you know? I just.. I don’t want to make you feel worse. I can go, if it’s better, for you.”

“Please don’t,” Lexa replied urgently, her fingers grazing Clarke’s wrist unintentionally. She pulled her hand back quickly, her cheeks turning pink as she shook her head. “It’s—I thought it was going to be awful, and I’d ruin the whole summer because I couldn’t even.. look at you, without.. But it—seeing you now, and.. here, where I always feel..”

“Safe,” Clarke supplied quietly, to which Lexa nodded.

“Safe. It just.. I really am happy to see you, Clarke. I mean, it's great. Even.. better than I expected." Lexa’s cheeks were a deepening red now, and she looked away as though she’d said something embarrassing; but Clarke merely smiled.

“I definitely know what you mean about that." She relaxed then, and laid her head on Lexa’s slightly sun-kissed shoulder with a smile. Lexa’s toes wiggled inside her plain sneakers as she smiled genuinely for the first time since she’d arrived. Clarke’s index finger slid to rest against her pinkie finger, and her ankle gave Lexa's a gentle nudge. “About seeing you, all of it. It's way better than I expected. And that was a really, really high bar already.”

Lexa smiled, shifting back on the bale, her relaxed posture allowing her leg to lightly bump Clarke’s as the wind swayed their dangling feet. It was a comforting, comfortable moment; peaceful in a way neither had felt in quite some time. It was nearly intoxicating.

Clarke wasn’t sure what possessed her—if it had been the intoxicating moment, the sweet scent of the lake wafting in on the wind, or just the overall press of summer against warm skin that made her suddenly brave and stupid— but her index finger lifted just slightly and tentatively grazed the surface of Lexa's knuckle.

Clarke felt like time was standing still for a moment as her traitorous index finger paused mid-stroke, and Lexa paused mid-breath. The moment was more tense than any other she could remember in her almost-14-years of experience; which frankly, was next to none. She’d kissed Bellamy Blake at the Unity Day fireworks, but she’d also split a wine cooler with Raven, and she’d kissed him, too. Then one and a half months with that idiot Finn, who was apparently dating every girl in their year for half the summer in rotation.

It wasn’t that Clarke wasn’t _interested_ in girls; quite the opposite, she preferred them. Rather, she preferred the idea of them, and the sight of them, generally. She had never actually liked a specific one yet. Not an attainable girl, anyway; she doubted Angelina Jolie counted, as everyone had a crush on her. She was unsure if dating girls was the same as dating boys, and how you could tell which one of you was supposed to ask the other, or if it mattered.

She wondered if she had to ask Lexa about her preferences first. Obviously she wasn’t homophobic, but being raised in a lesbian household didn’t mean she couldn’t be heterosexual; not to mention possibly offended that maybe Clarke had assumed she liked girls just because her parents were gay. Clarke felt herself starting to panic, and odd as it was, considering what she had just done, she wished Raven was there with them. She’d make it awkward, sure, but in a way they would all be able to laugh about together and move on from. Not in this stiff, uncomfortable way that was already filling the room as Lexa remained both silent and still. Clarke began to pull her finger back, deciding it was probably the best course of action regardless.

And then..

Lexa inhaled and slid her pinkie over ever so slightly; so that when Clarke’s index came to rest once more, it naturally curled around Lexa’s finger like the entire thing had been planned. After that, they both sat quietly for a long time while Clarke’s head remained on Lexa’s shoulder, their fingers gently linked as they listened to the horses softly huffing and shuffling in their stalls.

♾

Most years, Camp Trigedakru had been lucky. The final day of camp had consistently brought with it a beautiful day, weather-wise for years. Sunny and warm; the perfect weather for tracking down lost shoes by the art cabin, or for one last quick dip in the lake before the busses and cars began packing into the field just outside the main office. A final gasping breath of summer that was bittersweetly tainted with the knowledge that it was really already gone with the first autumn leaf that fell.

Not this year, though. This year, it was absolutely pouring.

Clarke and Lexa squealed in unison as they rushed into the stables, every inch of them soaked to the bone with the icy rain. Lexa laughed as they tumbled into a loose pile of hay on the ground, and Clarke shook her head rapidly like a dog, spraying more rainwater all over them; splattering it on the ground surrounding them. Clarke laid back then, next to Lexa, and their heads rested comfortably against one another’s in the relatively soft pile.

“I don’t want to go home,” Lexa whispered, wrapping the too-large hoodie’s sleeves around her waist, essentially hugging herself. She reached for Clarke’s hand—a gesture that was comforting and familiar by now, and Clarke laced their fingers together practically on instinct.

“Me, either,” Clarke replied. For the first time, it was actually true, too. Clarke was nearly dreading going back to the constant fighting, and her mother’s constant absence, and her friends’ various levels of angst and relationship drama. She wanted to stay where she was; in geographical location as well as the feelings that surrounded and pressed in on her when her hand reassuringly squeezed Lexa’s.

“I’ll call you every weekend,” Clarke promised, guiding Lexa’s hand so it was hovering over her own chest—still clasped with Clarke’s hand—as Clarke ran the fingertips of her free hand lightly over the back of Lexa’s. She traced idly over all of the lines and divots of Lexa’s skin.

“My uncle will get pissed,” Lexa replied reluctantly. Her voice took on a masculine, affected sort of tone that Clarke had come to recognize as her best impression of her weird, crotchety old uncle. “What could a kid have to talk to another kid about on the phone? Go play outside.”

“Go play outside?” Clarke chuckled. “Does he think you’re ten?”

“Pretty much,” Lexa responded bitterly, rolling onto her side. “I’m gonna be in enough trouble for this as it is.”

Lexa used her free hand—the one that wasn’t caught up in Clarke’s affectionate fiddling at the moment—to tug a chunk of her hair behind her ear and squint at it as she held it up in the muted light of the barn. No longer her natural golden-brown, the streak was now a muted blue that nearly matched Clarke’s eyes and was the exact same shade as the blue raspberry juice the canteen served. Clarke had a matching strip in the same spot, but she’d chosen to tint it the bright pink of the canteen's strawberry-lemonade.

Lexa flicked her KoolAid stained hair back behind her ear as Clarke rolled to her side as well, so they were fully facing each other. The sounds of a large vehicle—a bus, likely—entering the campground wafted in faintly over the sound of the slowing rain, and it was like an electrical shock to both of the girls, who cringed sadly in unison.

Lexa gazed at Clarke, her eyelashes fluttering slightly as she tried to hold back the tears she knew were rapidly approaching a boil in her uneasy chest. “I don’t want to go,” she nearly whined, burying her face against Clarke’s chest.

Clarke closed her eyes briefly, wrapping her arm around Lexa and rubbing her back gently. “How much can I call you without your uncle having a wiggins?”

Lexa shrugged a little. “I—I don’t know. He’s.. unpredictable, you know?” Her voice came quicker for a moment as she elaborated for the millionth time, “I told you, he doesn’t.. he would never hurt me. He’s not like that, he’s just.. old. And weird. And stuffy and boring.”

“I know,” Clarke said, but she looked dubious. “Can’t you just go stay with Anya? It’s not like you’re a kid who needs diapers changed or something.”

Lexa seemed to bury herself deeper inside Clarke’s embrace. “She said I can, when she gets settled and stuff on base. But she’s not allowed, when she’s still at Basic.”

"That's a stupid rule and I hate it," Clarke informed her, tucking her chin against her head affectionately. They let out a shared sigh and shifted a little closer together, their knees gently bumping as they held onto one another like it might prevent the summer from coming to its inevitable ending. 

“We’re only, like, three or four hours away from each other. I could come visit you, too,” Clarke offered. “Or we could just kidnap you. I bet Raven and Octavia would help. We could steal Bellamy’s truck.”

Lexa smiled dreamily, resting their clasped hands against her chest. “That would be awesome. I think your parents would probably notice, though.”

“Dad doesn’t come in my room anymore, really. And my mom would have to like, come home sometimes, to notice anything. I could hide you for years, and they'd never even know."

They both smiled at the childish fantasy as the rain began to finally let up outside. Clarke squinted out the doorway, where the first slivers of sun looked like they were fighting to show through the otherwise overcast sky.

“We’ll figure something out. For the phone calls. And I’ll write to you every sing—okay, probably not every single day," Clarke admitted. "Or even week. But I’ll write to you a lot. Especially when school starts, need to use my notebooks for something.”

“Something like learning?” Lexa teased gently, but her face was remorseful. They could clearly hear the busses beginning to arrive, and the time seemed to be slipping away faster than ever. Clarke didn’t seem to hear her or the busses, though; she just continued to gaze silently at Lexa, looking a little nervous.

“Clarke?” Lexa’s brow furrowed with concern, beginning to look a little nervous herself. “Are you okay?“

Neither of them could figure out if Clarke had actually been the one who leaned forward first, or if it had been Lexa who’d done so; but they shared a surprised sharp inhale, emitted softly from the backs of their throats as their lips met tentatively in a gentle kiss.Clarke felt like she was tumbling into a dream world of some kind.

It was better than Bellamy Blake at the Unity Day fireworks, better than the way Finn had seemed to be trying to swallow her head. Better than the best daydreams she'd come up with. The back of her neck tingled, and her lips buzzed with electricity where they pressed against Lexa’s. Her lips were soft and gentle, sweet and trembling even as they separated. Lexa was so stunned by what had just happened that she didn't even bother to wipe away the single tear that trickled down her cheek; it was evidence of her surety that Clarke was just an affectionate person, and their lazy summer cuddling hadn't meant anything more than that.

“Wow,” Clarke whispered, nearly breathless. “You’re _really_ good at that..”

“Um, ah.. really? I’ve never.. well, you know..” Lexa blushed profusely. "Y--you are, too."

“I have, but it was nothing like that,” Clarke looked booth stunned and suddenly nervous. “Do you think.. would you want..”

“To do it again?” Lexa supplied, then nodded quickly. “I—if you do.”

Clarke smiled, her cheeks flaming red. “I very, lots of do.”

“Okay,” Lexa’s voice was barely a whisper as her eyes closed above her reddened cheeks, preparing herself briefly.

Clarke leaned in and pressed her lips to Lexa’s once more; but this time, in her best impression of what she'd seen in the movies, her tongue lightly swept across Lexa’s bottom lip, testing the action out. A soft gasp was choked in Lexa’s throat as she parted her lips to unsurely meet Clarke’s tongue with her own. Clarke could hear and feel the vibrations of the fireworks, just as she had with Bellamy, only this time they were exploding inside her own body, inside her own head; not up in the sky. She was kissing _Lexa_. Her best friend, her bunkmate. Her.. Lexa. 

When they finally pulled back, Lexa had a slightly dopey smile on her face, like she’d gotten some kind of a buzz from the kiss. Clarke knew the feeling, and assumed there was a similarly goofy look on her own face. Kissing Lexa had been.. amazing. Insane. The best thing in the world.

At least, right up until Clarke’s brain began spinning, and then it suddenly seemed like the dumbest thing they could have done. She thought her chest might collapse with the weight of the knowledge that they would never be able to make it work, and she found herself in a daze, taken prisoner by her own body as it pulled away from Lexa. It was the opposite of what Clarke wanted, but she didn’t seem to be in complete control of herself.

Lexa was amazing, but she was also a girl Clarke didn’t even know how to carry on a relationship with outside of camp; a girl Clarke didn't know outside of the little bubble they’d been existing in all summer. Like it or not, Lexa was going back to her uncle’s house, back to her regular life, and Clarke was going back to her own house and regular life three hours and a long distance call away. School would start, and local friends would reappear from whatever they’d spent their summers doing.

And maybe they’d be able to keep in touch for awhile, but eventually the distance would begin to weigh heavily on them. It was hard enough for adults to make a long distance relationship work; forget a couple of high school freshmen. Clarke felt tears beginning to form in the corners of her eyes as she studied the nervously trembling girl; as she tried to ignore all of the rationality inside her brain in favor of falling into the quiet space between herself and Lexa, but found that she couldn't ignore it anymore; not with the dreamy summer tearing away from them and out the door already.

Clarke found that the quiet space had begun to dissipate as well, and she felt like she might be sick as she shifted back a few more centimeters, despite her unwillingness to do so. The further she scooted back, the more Lexa’s face fell, until they were nearly a foot apart from one another, with a teary gaze their only connection. Lexa looked crushed, as if she’d known this moment was coming, and Clarke just looked scared and full of regret as she slowly stood, her legs trembling beneath her. She might have tried to blame it on being cold and wet from the rain, but Clarke knew it had absolutely nothing to do with that.

Lexa watched her moving away, her eyes welling quickly. She went to say something, but Clarke quickly shook her head.

“I—I’m sorry, Lexa. I’m sorry. This.. it isn’t really.. I mean..”

“It’s okay,” Lexa replied robotically; but it really wasn’t, and it didn't matter why. Not really. She felt shattered, betrayed, and suddenly lost. She too, stood on shaky legs, and wordlessly followed a strangely silent Clarke out of the barn, trying to figure out exactly where it had all gone wrong. She still hadn’t figured it out by the time the cacophony of parents and overstimulated campers voices began to reach their ears, and they continued to their cabin in quiet discomfort as Lexa realized she might never find the answer and might need to just make her peace with it; particularly if she wasn’t going to ask Clarke to elaborate on what it was, exactly, that had scared her so.

But she couldn’t; Lexa couldn't bring herself to talk about it; so she grabbed her already-packed backpack and duffel bag, glancing around the cabin she didn’t think she’d ever see again either, avoiding Clarke’s painful gaze.It had been stupid, childish; all of it. Nothing but two kids thinking up unrealistic ways to change their lives—an immature daydream, better left here, in this dreamy summer life, than carried home and dragged out even more painfully, she supposed.

“Maybe it is better this way,” Lexa found her lips saying. Clarke looked at her quickly, with a strange but unreadable expression on her face. “A clean break. It will be easier for both of us, don’t you think?”

“Um—“ Clarke seemed to cringe as she rolled the thought around in her head before finally nodding, albeit reluctantly. “I—I guess so. Sure. A clean break.”

“A clean break,” Lexa repeated again unnecessarily; and both of their faces were lined with misery as they left behind their cabin at Camp Trigedakru for what they both sensed was going to be the last time.


	4. Say Goodbye (Push Rewind)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke's late to college, because of course she is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry there was a delay in posting, but this chapter just kept getting longer and longer. This entire story was originally intended to be a one part with around 3-4k words max. 
> 
> Oops?  
> ( ب_ب )

I guess I just wanted you to know  
I can't believe I let you go  
So can we push-push-push rewind  
Go-go back in time? Take-take-take me back  
I wanna go back, back to what we had  
I'm hanging by a thread, I’m tearing at the seams  
Do you remember when we started this mess?  
My heart was beating out of my chest  
Oh we were flying so high, yeah partners in crime  
So why'd we ever say good bye?  
Remember when we, when we, had it all  
Do you remember when?

\- Chris Wallace, “Remember When (Push Rewind)”

**Polis University, Graduate Dorms**

**Room 316, August 2012**

The new graduate dorms had only been completed just the previous summer, and it showed. Unfortunately, the two-person, two bedroom apartments still hadn’t offered enough comfort for Clarke, given her last roommate’s socialite behavior; it seemed nearly obscene at this level of education, and yet, here she was. Moving all of her belongings that she’d just moved in a few days ago, again.

Her new roommate was in the kitchenette, cooking something on the stove that smelled like grilled cheese, but Clarke couldn’t see past the stack of boxes in her arms at the stove or the girl. She faltered briefly, and an empty plastic shower caddy toppled off the pile.

Her new roommate caught it smoothly, just out of sight, while announcing, “Hey! You must be my new roommate. They told me someone was moving in today, but not who. A little late with the dorm assignments?”

“Yeah, I’m alwa— _unf_ ,” Clarke let out a grunt as she banged into the doorframe of her room. “—always late, even when there’s no reason for it. I _was_ on time, but I requested a transfer. My old roommate is in a sorority and majoring in Trust Fund Spending,” she explained.

The girl snorted as she waited patiently behind Clarke, who was still trying to figure out how to get herself and the boxes into the room without falling. It wasn’t looking all that great, and Clarke groaned as she forced the too-wide stack of boxes in her arms through the narrow doorway. She was suddenly thankful she’d spent the summer toning up at the gym with Raven and Octavia, however reluctant she’d initially been to do so. If her ass had been any wider just then, she might not have made it—and even then she didn't _quite_ make it completely.

As she entered, the bottom box gave out, spilling its belongings from her arms to the floor. With a frustrated cry, Clarke gave up entirely and heaved the other boxes on top of the pile; then promptly stumbled over her laundry basket and landed in it.

Clarke just wanted to die in the moment. Her roommate was probably already headed for the RA’s office to request—no, make that beg for—a transfer of her own, maybe to Clarke's spot in the older dorm, now that she’d seen the train wreck she’d be living with. She sat in the most undignified position she could have imagined in the narrow, rounded basket with her knees uncomfortably close to her eye sockets. She blushed furiously as she slowly lifted her eyes to her roommate, every cell in her body cringing all at once.

Her new roommate stood there with the shower caddy clutched tightly in her white-knuckled hand. Dark brown locks with golden highlights fell in loose waves around her shoulders, framing wide viridescent eyes that were frozen in shock.

Clarke choked on her own saliva, leaning forward to cough over the edge of the basket. She misjudged her weight, and hoped the floor would open up to swallow her as the basket dumped her out, leaving her sprawled on the floor, on her knees and eye-to-hip with—

“Lexa?” Clarke gasped, her throat catching as her voice caved in on itself. She felt like an idiot as she remained kneeling in Lexa’s lanky shadow, silent for far too long—but at the same time, there was something incredibly intimate about it that brought a blush quickly to both of their cheeks.

“Clarke,” she replied, putting her hand out to help her stand. She said it almost as a prayer, like she’d been searching all over and was filled with relief at finally locating her. Clarke had never heard her name sound so beautiful, so melodic before; it was intoxicating. Clarke wasn’t sure whether the sound or Lexa’s hand tightly gripping her forearm was doing more of the work lifting her up, really.

“Wow, uh, you look—uh, really, very good. Better than good,” Clarke stuttered, her cheeks turning even redder. “Excellent, really.”

Lexa flushed with embarrassment, but even _she_ couldn’t possibly deny how kind puberty had been to her. She had shed her round, chubby cheeks, leaving behind a jawline that could cut glass. Her eyes were still naturally wide and rounded, giving her face a youthful look that she’d probably always have. She was lean, but not scrawny as she’d once been; in fact, she was entirely muscle now, Clarke realized with a slight gulp. The muscles in her flexed arm looked like a tight, nearly solid length of thick cordage as Lexa effortlessly tugged Clarke back onto her feet.

It wasn’t an excessive body-builder type of muscular—something Clarke had always found fairly unattractive, truth be told—but more like Lexa had simply expanded her athletic horizons beyond horseback riding. Freeweights, or kickboxing maybe; from the looks of it she enjoyed it and seemed to spend a lot of time doing it.

Her legs went on _forever_ , Clarke quickly realized, and whether it was due to some very good genes, pure dumb luck, or the result of her athletic interests, Clarke couldn't know, but Lexa’s thin, muscular legs ended in a firm but sinfully full ass; the kind of ass that belonged on the pages of the Victoria’s Secret catalog, or the teaser images on a website in Incognito mode. Certainly that kind of blatantly panty-dropping ass did _not_ belong on a childhood friend that Clarke had very suddenly found herself living with.

“Thank you, Clarke. You look.. amazing, too,” Lexa replied awkwardly, her eyes ticking to where she and Clarke were still gripping each others’ forearms. Clarke’s eyes followed, and then met hers as the shared memory of their very first meeting at Camp Trigedakru hit them in unison. They gave each other a firm shake and nod, and then started laughing together as they let go, the tension dissipating to a vaguely functional level.

“Is this for real? I can’t believe this is happening,” Clarke shook her head with a smile. “How long have you lived on campus? Have we just been passing each other for years here and not noticed?” 

"No, I actu—" Lexa had just begun to respond when the fire alarm started going off. She reluctantly broke their gaze as she turned and bolted towards the kitchen, calling back, “Shit!”

Clarke’s eyes widened as she took off into Lexa’s wake with a similar exclamation, skidding into a thick cloud of smoke. It was a chaotic distraction for a few minutes as they ran around opening windows and looking for anything that might have closely resembled a fan.

The smoke alarm finally went silent. Lexa glared at the hunk of charcoal that was responsible for the thick smoke cloud that hung in their dorm as a cough and a teasing voice sounded from the doorway.

“I literally just went to park the truck, and you’re already burning the place down. What the fuck, Clarke?”

Clarke coughed in response, waving a piece of clothing from one of her boxes at the smoke to encourage it out the window. “Octavia? Where the hell did you park, Argentina?”

“Don’t cry for me, Argentinaaaaa! The truth is, I never left youuuu!” Octavia belted out as she swung herself through the doorway and gave a dramatic bow below the hovering mist.

Clarke just stared at her sourly, but Lexa clapped lightly, as did someone passing by in the hallway. “You have a beautiful voice, Octavia. Are you in the arts program here?”

Octavia snickered. “Oh, no way. I’m not a college brain like our Clarkey, here. My boyfriend Lincoln, my girlfriend Niylah, and I are in a band, I’m the drummer. And a waitress, for now. But like, our music is serious. We just got a record deal and everything.”

“That’s amazing, congratulations,” Lexa smiled, leaning against the wall and furtively poking at her charred lunch. “Lexa. I’m a 2-L, but I was waitlisted here. It’s better than my second choice school. So to answer your question,” she turned to Clarke with a gentle smile. “This is my first semester. And I had a death in the family, so I was late arriving, too.”

"Oh, god." Clarke’s eyes widened quickly. “Not Anya?”

Lexa was momentarily stunned, before she turned, mildly slack-jawed, to Clarke. “I, uh.. I can’t believe you remembered. Wow." Lexa pushed herself to snap out of it, shaking it off for the time being. "Um, no. No, not my sister; it was our Uncle Titus. He was sick for awhile, and just.. really unhappy after my moms died. It was kind of a blessing, honestly. He was.. a little unbalanced near the end.”

“I’m sorry,” Clarke said sincerely, her tone taking on a more gentle lilt. Octavia, however, lit up as she mentally caught up with what was going on.

“Wait, you’re Lexa? Like, _the_ Lexa, from Camp Trigedakru? The one her and our other idiot wouldn’t shut up about ever?” Octavia was aghast, in complete disbelief. “The legend herself, Commander Lexa the Valiant.”

Lexa chuckled lightly, her cheeks flushing. “That’s me. When did I become a Commander, though? I thought I was _Sir_ Lexa, but this is a promotion, right?”

“A totally invalid one,” Octavia huffed, scuffing the side of her shoe against Clarke’s and swatting at her. “Based on a _lie_. Those two assholes told me that you all held a vote in my absence, and it was 3-1 that you were the Commander now. And oddly enough, since we've never met before, your orders included _all_ future slumber parties were to be held in my basement, whether or not you showed up for them.”

Lexa blinked in confusion and looked at Clarke, who snorted derisively. “Come on, O. Are you really still bitter about that? You had a big screen and a mini fridge full of soda. My bedroom had a rug covered in dog hair, and Raven’s mom didn’t even let Raven sleep at her own house half the time. Can you really blame us?”

"Yes," Octavia responded, shrugging dismissively. "I can and I do. I feel very used," she intimated dramatically.

“I feel used too,” Lexa sassed, joining in as she crossed her arms and her long, lean, muscular legs at the knee. “What benefits do I get as the Commander of the Musketeers? Are they retroactive? What are my duties, beside slumber party delegating?”

"Spoken like a true law student. You were right; I do like this one, Griff," Octavia smirked as she popped a handful of Tic-Tags into her mouth, and offered the container to Clarke and Lexa, who each took a handful and thanked her.

“Well, you definitely have to help your new roommate unpack her shit, especially since half of it’s broken now, because of your new roommate's wide ass," Clarke suggested hopefully.

“I think my roommate has a very nice ass, actually,” Lexa returned smoothly, her eyes glittering just a little as they dropped to Clarke’s hips and back up again. Apparently she'd noticed Clarke's earlier staring.

Now Clarke was near speechless, and Lexa's heart pounded in her chest, as though it were angrily demanding to know what the hell she thought she was doing, being so irresponsibly brazen. Her cheeks heated up a bit as she watched Clarke try to locate her tongue.

Octavia’s eyebrows shot up with amusement and she clapped her hands together once, clearing her throat. “They really _were_ 'roommates', huh?"

Clarke lightly thumped her forehead against the wall in response while Lexa turned an even brighter shade of red, and Octavia smirked at them both.

"Anyway, that’s my cue to bounce. We have practice from now until the recording session, and I already dumped the rest of your shit into one of the lopsided bins with wheels, so it’s in the lobby.”

Clarke shot daggers at Octavia, silently pleading with her not to abandon the awkward situation and make it even more awkward. “You seriously left my stuff down there? Why didn’t you just bring the cart up with you?”

“Because I am your friend, not your butler. I drove you here, I still haven’t gotten the Frappuccino you promised me and yet I am letting you off the hook so you can stay here and flirt with the love of you and Raven's life," Clarke began to protest; she hadn't intended to cancel she and Octavia's brunch plans, but Octavia cut her off. "It's no biggie, Griff. Anyway, Lincoln just texted me a bunch of emojis that are like, an eggplant and some rain and a peach so I need to go call him back and let him know I'm headed over."

Lexa choked on a combined laughter-slash-gasp, and Clarke pressed her face against the wall, praying for an immediate, swift, and painless death. Octavia tugged open the door, widening the radius in which people could hear their conversation, before placing her hand gently on Clarke’s head.

“As you head into this next phase of your life, young SpaceBi, I just wanted to remind you of the most important lesson you will ever learn, here, on this hollowed ground of education and knowledge: Make sure she’s clean before ya make the bed lean.”

Clarke’s entire face burned with humiliation as snickers found their way through the opened doors of several dorms on her floor; where several residents were now watching her supposed best friend walk to the rickety elevator at the opposite end of the hall.

“That’s clever, that’s really adorable and also not offensive in the least, O. You should stick _that_ little gem into one of your songs, in between your banging and grunting deep background vocal lyrics about your nine thousand exes and one summer you spent in Montauk as a kid.”

“Enjoy med school, Clarke! Don’t do anyone I wouldn’t do!” Octavia threw back cheerily, completely unruffled by the—admittedly somewhat true—accusation.

“And I would definitely do _that_ ,” she pointed towards their dorm with a wink, giving Clarke a thumbs up and exaggerated nod as she boarded the elevator; Clarke waved, but with her middle finger elevated towards Octavia.

“Okay, thanks! You’re a terrible person, love you anyway!”

“Love you, too, Griff!” Octavia gave a friendly wave as the elevator doors swallowed her.

Clarke let out a frustrated whine as she slammed their door shut and put the bolt in it. She slouched against the door with her hand over her face, her golden tendrils forming a protective curtain around her shame.

“I’m not offended,” Lexa reassured her. “She’s funny.”

“I’m glad one of us thinks so,” Clarke grumbled. “Listen, I—uh. I’m sorry, Lexa. About your uncle, and about..” She paused, letting out a slow, tension- laced breath. “Well, really. All of it. Everything.”

Lexa’s face grew a bit pale, and she cleared her throat nervously. “I, uh.. We don’t need to talk about this, really. It was a lifetime ago, we were just kids. You have nothing to be sorry for, Clarke.”

Clarke just shook her head quietly, tucking her lips between her teeth as the grey in her eyes seemed to spread with the sadness and guilt creeping across her face.

Lexa stayed awkwardly quiet, and after a long while she lightly added, “Too bad there’s no stable to go hide in, huh?”

Clarke’s lips curved then, into just the barest hint of a smile. “No horses, but I think I know a place that could work..”

♾

They stood on the dorm roof with a bottle of wine that Clarke had produced from one of her collapsed boxes. They passed the bottle back and forth as they watched the sun beginning to lower behind the breathtaking backdrop of Polis' skyline.

Occasionally their shoulders brushed, and there was a muted electricity that crackled in the atmosphere between them. The air around them, however, was thick with uncertainty and regret, and unspoken apologies and lost youth, and any other number of darkened emotions and memories. It was stifling; nearly suffocating, and they both knew the bubble was ready to break.

Neither of them expected Lexa to be the one who finally prodded at the fragile shell that was squeezing ever more tightly down on them. But something had to be done before it broke on its own, before the bubble could shatter and turn the remains of their shared past into a far more un-clearable mess than it already was. So Lexa prodded; if only because she needed to know the truth, and oddly enough, felt that she could trust Clarke to give it to her.

“Why didn’t you ever call me?” Lexa’s voice sounded smaller than ever, the setting sun over the beautiful view combining with Clarke’s presence making her feel strangely brave. She had uttered the innocent question so softly that she wasn’t even sure if Clarke had heard her, but she wasn’t brave enough to ask a second time. After a long, anxious silence, Clarke’s voice was both painful and pained in her response.

“I wanted to. God, I really wanted to, Lexa, but I.. My uh—my dad passed away,” Clarke finally admitted flatly, her strange, sickened expression coated in a sheen of disbelief, like she still wasn’t sure if it was the truth of what had happened. 

Clarke looked at the city even more strangely, shaking her head slowly—seemingly talking almost to herself while simultaneously questioning the validity of the words she was speaking. “It was a car accident. I had this stupid thing after school, and he was rushing to get there, and..”

"It's not your fault," Lexa instantly replied, her face softening immediately. Clarke looked stunned, like she hadn't expected Lexa to pick up on what direction she was already heading in, and it flashed in her eyes only briefly.

"I know," Clarke replied, her tone dull as the surprise faded and she turned her head away in shame and disbelief.

"Clarke," Lexa said firmly. She waited, then, for Clarke to turn back; once their gaze was locked, she continued in a pronounced, but gentle, careful tone. "It is _not_ your fault."

Clarke just looked at her silently as the tears overflowed, freeing themselves from the confines of her eyelids with a soft whoosh of breath.

“I didn’t have the courage to call you. Between what happened at the end of camp, and then losing my dad, and knowing firsthand what you must have been feeling all year, I just—I didn’t want to make it harder for either of us.”

Lexa swallowed hard, glancing around the roof a bit uncomfortably, trying to hide how much devastation one little truth could cause.

Something caught her eye at Clarke's wrist then, and, grateful for a distraction, Lexa tilted her head to confirm that Clarke's father's watch was still strapped to it. However, the hands were still, and the face was split by several fractures that spiderwebbed across the glass. Clarke noticed her looking, and raised her wrist up a little, showing her the broken watch, whose hands now pointed eternally to 3:07. 

"He was wearing it that day. Mom said she'd pay to get it fixed, get it working again, but I just.. It felt connected to him somehow, like what if the last thing he did was look at it and think of me being disappointed or-or upset with him, because he was late? You know?”

“Clarke,” Lexa sought her attention softly, ducking her head to catch Clarke’s watery gaze. “I’m sure his last thoughts were of you, but they were all happy ones. The same memories you and I find comfort in are the same ones they would have. Tell me something you remember, something that comforts you.” She waited patiently for her to find something; she was more interested in the myriad of strange expressions crossing Clarke's face than anything else at the moment, anyway. After a minute, Clarke shook her head with shame.

“All I can think about is—I don’t even know why, but.. Tucking me in. How stupid is that? I'm not a little kid, I don't need to be tucked in at all. He hasn’t even done it since I had my appendix out, and had to stay at the hospital overnight. I was like, 11. I just.. I really thought it would always be an option, as long as I wanted it. It made me feel safe. I never really feel that way anymore."

"I told you it was stupid." Clarke glanced briefly at her childhood friend's sympathetic eyes, feeling ashamed despite the obvious affection she found there. 

"It's not stupid at all," Lexa replied gently. "I _still_ miss my moms doing that. You're never to old to miss someone, or even just a time you felt safe, Clarke."

Clarke barely hesitated for a breath. "With you. At the stables."

"What?" Lexa furrowed her brow, mildly thrown by the seemingly sudden change of topic.

"When I last felt safe. It was with you, that day at the stables."

"Before we kissed," Lexa mumbled, trying to hide her regret and failing miserably.

"When." Lexa's head shot up at this, her face awash in disbelief. "When, we kissed. During. I felt _so_ safe, Lexa. I wasn't scared of the mean girls, or the lake piranhas—"

"There were no piranhas in the lake," Lexa chided, rolling her eyes at the impossible camp legend; but her face and chest were flushed, and she was visibly trembling.

"—or going home, starting high school, or anything. I wasn't scared of any of it, I wasn't scared of—of.." Clarke faltered, unable to name the insurmountable _thing_ that had always lurked in the background, quietly pumping anxiety through her chest day in and day out.

"Tomorrow," Lexa supplied softly; and that was it.

That was what Clarke had always feared, what everyone in the world did. _Whatever came next._ That was the universal yet unnamed feeling that seemed to drive everyone—the fear of it, and all of what it would bring with it.

"Just for a second, the fear went away. And then, I don't know. I don't know what happened, Lexa. It all came rushing back, along with a thousand new worries, and I was scared. I was more scared than I've ever been in my life. You were going back to your life, I was going back to mine. And we’d have said we’d keep in touch and make it work, but then we wouldn't because--"

"Because we were kids who lived nowhere near each other," Lexa sighed, finally understanding. Clarke hadn't been disgusted or felt tricked; quite the opposite. She'd _wanted_ to keep kissing every bit as much as Lexa had, she was afraid everything else would fall apart if she did. It probably _would_ have, and that was the hardest part to swallow.

"I'm so sorry, Lexa. It's--I really regret it. I never _ever_ wanted to hurt you. I really.. I liked you so much, you were my best friend, too, and I'm sorry. I know that doesn't take any of it back, I just.."

"It's okay, _Klark_ ," Lexa gently clicked her name, as she had their first summer together, the result of her missing teeth and a wandering tongue. "I get it now. I didn't then, and I—I wish I had just asked, I really do."

Clarke just smiled sadly. "I don't think I could have explained all of what I was feeling even if you _had_ asked."

“It’s okay. I probably couldn’t have understood it then, either,” Lexa admitted, lowering her head. “Just a perfect storm, I guess. It wasn’t our time.”

“Yeah.”

It was the truth; but it didn’t make it hurt any less. After a brief silence, Clarke leaned against the stone railing that ran the entire edge of the rooftop. Lexa took a last gulp of courage from the wine bottle and then set it down on the wall between them, resting her head on her folded arms and deciding to break the tension for both their sakes.

“It was really nice to finally meet Octavia after all these years. How is Raven doing, by the way?” Lexa asked, legitimately interested. She’d always liked Raven, and it had been nice to hear Octavia talk about her earlier in the day. Clarke brightened at the mention of her lifelong best friend, and gave Lexa an appreciative smile.

“She's good, really good. She’s a Marine, former combat engineer.”

“Former?” Lexa ran her fingertip slowly around the mouth of the bottle, with Clarke’s eyes following the subtle movement.

“She was in, um, a roadside bombing,” Clarke replied quietly, and Lexa couldn’t help it when her shoulders flinched instinctively in response. “It did serious damage to her spine and leg. Partially paralyzed her.”

“Jesus, I’m really sorry to hear that.” She really was; Raven had always been kind to her, and she was a big part of most of Lexa’s camp memories.

Truthfully, she’d missed Raven a lot over the years as well. Her sense of humor, her fearless nature, her impressive intelligence and slightly older age had positioned her as the determined protector of the Musketeers. No matter how many times they’d insisted it wasn’t a proper title, Clarke and Lexa had eventually surrendered and agreed to let Raven be henceforth known as “Sir Raven the Badass”.

"Me, too," Clarke replied quietly. “She struggled for awhile, but it didn’t take long for her to fight back. She got really pissed off and drunk-engineered a design for adaptive equipment that allows for full access to large mechanical structures like tanks, while harnessed."

"So mechanics don't need their legs," Lexa smiles slowly. "That's brilliant. Especially if she was drunk at the time.”

"Yeah," Clarke replied with a proud smile, running her nails idly over the curve of the wine bottle. "She scored herself a free ride up at MIT next semester and a chance to actually try to build it in their lab."

"Sounds like she's really living her best life," Lexa smiled, neatly creasing the edge of her sleeve.

“She usually is,” Clarke agreed, smiling to herself a little. “Her mom died a couple years after her last year at camp, of an overdose. She didn’t deal with it real well, until one of our teachers, Mr. Sinclair, ended up fostering and then legally adopting her. Turns out they’ve been really good for each other.”

“That’s really great,” Lexa leaned against the railing, taking the wine bottle and sipping from it. “Would it be weird if I asked if she has a Facebook or anything?”

Clarke’s cheeks lifted as she smiled. “Not at all. You know, Raven’s never stopped holding it over me that I supposedly scared off our Commander, especially once she’s got a few drinks in her.” Lexa laughed, propping her chin up on her arm as she leaned on the wall, overlooking the Polis skyline, listening as Clarke continued. “She doesn’t use Facebook. According to her, it’s the devil incarnate. She’s got an Instagram, though. Started posting pictures of her new lab space already, of course."

“Of course,” said Lexa, chuckling lightly. She could only imagine how much of a dream it must seem to Raven, who had always believed that being smart was more important than being liked, yet been the kind of person who was easy to like anyway.

Clarke smiled knowingly as she threw back another gulp of wine. “She’ll be really happy to see you again. Not as happy as I am, of course, Commander.”

Lexa’s cheeks turned slightly pink as she took the bottle Clarke was offering, her voice suddenly a little shy. “I’ll be only a little less happy than I am to see you, too.”

Clarke watched her quietly for a minute, the moment feeling tense and fragile and far too disorienting to think straight, particularly with the wine beginning to blur the thoughts that flickered through her head. Lexa didn’t interrupt the moment, but she did hold Clarke’s gaze. The bright emeralds of her eyes were burning as they maintained a connection with Clarke’s cerulean pools.

Their lips met midway, both of them leaning into the other in near perfect choreography that seemed to last forever. The kiss was soft, reassuring, even as it heated up. Clarke’s hands fumbled at Lexa’s waist, and Lexa’s fluttered near Clarke’s hair, her jaw; unsure of where she wanted to set them down. She settled for resting one on Clarke’s cheek, and the other over Clarke’s hand at herwaist, guiding it carefully around her hip as she leaned into Clarke more fully, lingering. Clarke let out a soft gurgle of discontentment in the back of her throat as they slowly parted, both with their chests heaving and cheeks flushed.

“I really want to kiss you again,” Clarke murmured before Lexa’s lips had even entirely detached from her own, her voice barely a whisper on the sweet autumn breeze. “Kind of a lot.”

“Me, too.” Lexa inhaled sharply, but her gaze didn’t flicker away for a moment.

“Where?” Clarke breathed impatiently, as though she’d suddenly become lost on the roof of her own building. It was too open for the things that were already running through Clarke’s mind, no matter how much she tried to reign her thoughts in.

“Wherever you want,” Lexa replied, her eyes twinkling mischievously when Clarke’s breath hitched at the implication.

“You’re the slumber party delegator, aren’t you? _Commander_ ,” Clarke let the title drip with a deeply sultry tone from her lips, and Lexa’s own mouth rapidly went dry. She had no idea how Clarke could take something so innocuous and make it sound so very filthy, but it was definitely making breathing a little bit more difficult.

“Inside,” Lexa decided. Clarke shivered as her imagination ran wild, her eyes locking on Lexa’s ridiculously long fingers thirstily. She took a pointedly slow sip from the bottle, ensuring Lexa had an unobstructed view of her tongue teasing suggestively against the lip of the bottle.

Lexa huffed quietly as Clarke handed the bottle over, then polished off the last few sips before extending her hand slightly. Clarke took it firmly in her own, leading an increasingly hungry-looking Lexa back down the rooftop stairs and to their dorm. They waited in the elevator, their hands still clasped, sharing smoldering looks and grazed knuckles as the rickety box made beeps and some fairly concerning grinding noises the whole way down to their floor.

When they arrived, Clarke seemed to briefly forget how doors worked, and tried to tug Lexa through the doorway at the same time as herself. They laughed as they crashed into the door frame, their bodies pressed tightly together, with Lexa’s loose top providing a teasing glance at the soft, black bra that lay beneath. Clarke let out a soft whine of frustration that made Lexa laugh as she deliberately leaned forward just enough to allow Clarke a slightly better view.

She smirked playfully, enjoying Clarke’s obvious struggle between their problematically narrow doorframe and her reluctance to look away from Lexa’s now-deliberately lowered neckline. After a moment of indignant eye-pleading from Clarke, Lexa took pity on her and guided them more carefully through the door, their hands still linked.

They paused in front of Clarke’s room, softly giggling together in the suddenly tension-filled, but exciting moment. They both jumped briefly at a sudden chorus of voices from the hallway. It appeared to be a roommate’s disagreement, enhanced by some sort of intoxicant. After a moment, a voice boomed through the corridor that Clarke immediately recognized as their R.A.—a third year law student named Harper McIntyre, whom everyone knew was the cool R.A.; she rarely ratted or even got involved in most issues. It was a well-known fact that Harper was against any sort of authority, particularly any that were held over adults—or reasonable facsimiles, anyway.

Except for the first few weeks of the year; when her nerves regularly became very obviously close to snapping. The phenomenon occasionally drove her to activate her normally untapped powers out of pure aggravation. Currently, she seemed to be trying to scold the entire floor for the cacophony of noise she’d run out of patience for. She had merely opened her door to yell into the hallway, however, rather than investigate the issue, probably to tell them to sort it out themselves _quietly_ —typical Harper behavior, especially when her fiancé was visiting.

“Attention! Attention, _please_ —“ Harper’s voice was already strained, and Clarke briefly made a mental note to bring her the traditional new school year’s bottle of wine gift. Harper blew her police whistle, causing every student for three floors to shudder in sync; as expected, the background noise quickly ceased.

However, Clarke quickly forgot about Harper, the college hallway drama, the wine, and everything else when something clicked in her memory that spread a smile slowly across her face. Lexa turned to Clarke with a gleeful look that matched her own, already on the same page. Together, they began clapping and, in a well-harmonized unison, singing a song that neither was likely to ever forget.

**_Attention please, attention please!_ **

**_You should know that we’re the 9-Bs!_ **

**_Shoulders, head, toes, and knees!_ **

**_Every part makes us nine bees!_ **

**_Buzz, buzz, what’s that sound?_ **

**_The nine bees are buzzing around, hey!_ **

**_We’re nine bees, and we put the beat down, yay!_ **

**_Buzz, buzz, buzz, bizz, bizz, bizz!_ **

**_Oh, how exciting it is!_ **

**_To start out just a little me,_ **

**_And end up an awesome Nine Bee!_ **

They bent their arms into ‘wings’ and wiggled, bumping their hips and imaginary stingers together while making buzzing sounds, before bursting into laughter. Clarke stepped forward and her foot caught in one of her stray shoes that had made it into the hall when she’d fallen earlier. It was one of very few times she’d seen Clarke actually trip over the piles of debris she’d always left in her wake, Lexa realized briefly; just as Clarke instinctively grabbed for her, sending them both tumbling onto the pile of clothes. Neither one seemed hurt; in fact, they broke into another shared fit of giggles that lasted far longer than it should have as they lay entangled in Clarke’s belongings, their faces turning red with the exertion of their breathless laughter.

Slowly, Clarke began to realize that she was half in Lexa’s lap, her ass almost perfectly centered on Lexa’s thigh. Lexa apparently realized it at the same time, because their laughter began to taper off in a soft unison, and the tips of her ears began to turn red. They both remained perfectly still and silent, each afraid to break the spell that had been cast, their gazes locked tightly on one another.

And then slowly, carefully, and with an even more subtle movement than Clarke’s finger had once made to touch Lexa’s knuckle, Lexa flexed the thick cord of muscle in her thigh. It was barely a movement, but it allowed Clarke’s body to naturally settle into a far more intimate position and drew a soft gasp from her as it did.

It was too good to be true. Clarke searched Lexa’s eyes intently for the slightest of hesitation, but saw only Lexa doing the same. Slowly, the shared gaze morphed from searching into relief and then—as Clarke slowly rolled her hips and pressed her rapidly-heating center against Lexa’s thigh—to hunger.

Lexa moaned deeply; Clarke knew she had already soaked through her thin leggings; had no doubt that it would be quickly made obvious on Lexa’s dry, bare skin; and would bet anything that Lexa had just then realized it, too.

Clarke reached behind her, her fingers encircling Lexa’s slim wrists and guiding her hands around her hips. Lexa spread her palms on Clarke’s stomach as she pulled Clarke closer, until her back pressed against Lexa’s breasts. Clarke moaned shamelessly as her center slid slowly over the hard line of muscle in Lexa’s thigh, too turned on already to be embarrassed at the shining streak that now coated her bare leg.

Lexa rested back carefully, vaguely hoping Clarke didn’t have a sword or a jar of acid lurking in the chaotic mess—but decided quickly that she didn’t care if she was stained and run through repeatedly by the time they were done. It would be worth it, just to feel Clarke’s flesh against her own, to find out what Clarke felt like, tasted like; what she sounded like as she exploded in pleasure.

Glancing briefly at the scattered belongings, she discovered a large stuffed rabbit and pulled it close, resting her head against it. She offhandedly noted that it made a surprisingly comfortable pillow, and carefully guided Clarke back on top of her as she rested against it.Clarke stiffened slightly when she felt Lexa pulling her back.

“I’m gonna crush you,” she protested weakly, a soft huff escaping her lips as Lexa pressed her leg into her center once more.

“I guarantee you I can bench press at least twice what you weigh,” Lexa informed her, running her nails lightly up and down Clarke’s thighs, occasionally teasing them against her inner thighs.

“You don’t have to be so modest about it,” Clarke teased, but there was a tension in her husky tone as her legs instinctively parted further; searching, wanting. Needing. Lexa’s fingertips brushed over the crease at her pelvis, and Clarke’s hips jerked as she let out a deep, shaky moan.

“Jesus, Lexa..”

“I thought about you every day,” Lexa whispered, her lips brushing the shell of Clarke’s ear as her fingertips ghosted across her tender lower stomach, mapping out a path that was already driving Clarke a little insane and making it hard for her to follow Lexa’s words. “I never took it off..”

Lexa lifted one arm from Clarke’s thigh in the wake of a soft protest, holding it in her line of sight. Clarke gasped softly when she saw the incredibly frayed, timeworn loop of hemp that had been hidden beneath her sleeve. Clarke felt herself shaking with amazement. Her head grew suddenly dizzy, her vision swimming as she lifted her own arm and entwined her fingers with Lexa’s. Her own sleeve fell back as their palms pressed together, and tucked just under the edge of her father’s watch was her own, matching braided hemp bracelet.

Lexa let out a muted sob when she saw it, her head turning towards Clarke’s as emotion truly and completely overwhelmed her. Clarke shifted, moaning softly at the brief loss of Lexa’s leg between her own as she rolled onto her stomach instead, wanting—no, _needing_ —to face her, to look into Lexa’s eyes while they made love. She straddled Lexa’s leg as their hands met; their fingers curled around each other’s and Clarke pressed Lexa’s arms back into the pile on either side of her head. She leaned over and her lips met Lexa’s ready ones quickly, their tongues already dancing as their hips ground together. They kissed hungrily, and their hips finally found a rhythm that had both of them sweating and shivering within minutes.

It all fell away; all of the hurt, and the loss, and the sacrifice. All of the empty years they’d lost, all of the guilt and betrayal just melted away, and it felt like it was only yesterday that they’d shared a tender first kiss at the close of summer.At the same time, it felt like it was their first kiss all over again. No kiss had set Clarke on fire as quickly or as efficiently as the one she was sharing with Lexa at that moment, not even the one they’d just had on the roof. Surrounded by the arguably strange sea of chaos that was her organizational packing structure,Clarke felt her brain melting, and all of her blood seemed to be redirected to her heart and her core.

She kissed Lexa with purpose, with need, with the weight of all their stolen time and self doubt, all of their grief and pain, and with all of the hope she could muster in her fractured heart. Lexa returned the kiss in kind, and Clarke released one of her hands, her own sliding between their rolling hips and into the leg of Lexa’s denim shorts. Clarke gently pressed her fingers against Lexa’s underwear—which were likely ruined beyond rescue already—and slowly ran her fingertips along the drenched center panel.

“ _Clarke_ ,” Lexa pleaded as she arched into her touch, breaking the kiss to moan loudly into Clarke’s mouth. Clarke spread her own legs wider in response, grinding herself purposefully against Lexa’s strong thigh, her free hand still linked with Lexa’s. Lexa used her own free hand to push at Clarke’s leggings, sliding over her ass. Clarke pulled away quickly, and Lexa let out a whine before she could stop herself, and immediately blushed at her desperation. But Clarke just grinned predatorily and pulled her hoodie off, adding it to the pile beneath and around them. Lexa quickly pulled her own sweatshirt off as Clarke shifted to pull her leggings off, getting briefly tangled in the clothing and prompting Lexa to snicker.

“Shaddup,” Clarke grunted as she tossed the leggings aside with her underwear still dangling from them, then turned to Lexa with a fresh wolflike grin. She swatted Lexa’s hands away from her shorts, and grabbed the top button, undoing Lexa’s fly herself and taking her sweet time about it. Lexa let out a series of sharp exhales as Clarke leaned in, biting her zipper and tugging it down using only her teeth. Lexa shivered, her breath catching as she watched Clarke finish undressing her.

“Not laughing anymore, huh?” She mumbled teasingly against Lexa’s thigh as she tugged her shorts down, and then her underwear.

“Nuh-uh..”Lexa lifted her hips to allow Clarke to pull the garments free with a soft moan and rapid shake of her head. 

Clarke discarded the clothes into the corner of the room and straddled Lexa’s leg once more, leaning in for a deep, needy kiss while grinding her bare mound against Lexa's thigh with more purpose. They shifted together for a minute as they kissed, trying to get semi-comfortable on the uneven pile while exploring each and every inch the other had to offer. Then Lexa’s long, thin finger slid through Clarke’s parted, swollen lower lips slowly and very deliberately stroked a soft circle around the base of her clit.

Clarke gasped loudly and shuddered _hard_ ; Lexa let out a soft gasp at how soaked Clarke was already—absolutely dripping—and Lexa could hardly believe she had been the one to do it to her. _She’d_ been the one to make Clarke desperate and squirming within only minutes; it felt like a true badge of honor, and she continued lazily toying with Clarke’s drenched heat, exploring the spots that inspired her guttural moans, skipped heartbeats, and labored breaths. Clarke arched and panted above her, distracted from anything but Lexa’s touch; something Lexa was unexpectedly finding to be a strangely heady aphrodisiac. Clarke might’ve been on top, but it was clearly Lexa in control; Clarke was at her mercy, and Lexa felt nearly drunk with the need to reduce her to a squirming puddle on the floor, to find out what it would take to please Clarke so well, so thoroughly.

“Lexa, pl— _please_ , uh—“

Clarke’s desperate request was interrupted as Lexa, who didn’t need to be psychic to know what Clarke was trying to get at, gently pressed her finger inside Clarke’s more-than-welcoming heat. Clarke’s body rolled in an even stronger shudder as her scorching heat easily and quickly swallowed Lexa’s finger to the knuckle, prompting her to add a second to Clarke’s needy, grasping heat. Lexa moved her fingers carefully at first, pressing them in as deeply as she could and curling them slightly in towards Clarke’s front wall as she moved them back and forth slowly.

Clarke bucked wildly on Lexa’s skilled fingers, her head falling back as she rode Lexa for all she was worth; as Clarke slowly lost her mind. Her body was wracked with small jerks and jolts as Lexa’s expert fingers guided her higher and higher up the precipice; as Lexa began to tip her over it, but refused to let her fall yet.She arched and moaned Lexa’s name in a desperate mantra, her full breasts shaking enticingly with her body’s impending surrender. Lexa ducked her head, needing to have Clarke’s soft, rounded breast in her mouth, and sucked an already tight, hardened nipple between her lips, playfully running her teeth over it.

Her fingers played with her clit, toying with the stiffened bud until Clarke was begging her, pleading with her for release, for mercy; Lexa would deny her, and then abandon the hungry bud in favor of pressing her fingers into Clarke’s depths, fucking her slowly, torturously once again. She repeated the process until Clarke’s head lolled on her shoulders, until her body was drenched in sweat and arousal, until the muscles surrounding her hips were all twitching unevenly and out of sync with need.

“Lex—exa—“ Clarke’s expression wavered between pure, desperate need, and a clear promise that she would see to it Lexa shared in her pleasurable pain soon enough. Lexa shivered as she softly rolled her nipple between her teeth and rubbed her fingertips roughly against either side of Clarke’s needy, more-than-ready clit. She fingered her with purpose now, drawing Clarke up and up once more, but making it very clear there would be no more teasing.

Clarke choked on Lexa’s name as she came, arching and jerking against her as her body spasmed in pleasure. All the while, Lexa watched with awe, forgetting everything else for a moment. She forgot their first summer, their last summer, their first kiss, their painful parting. Lexa finally figured out how to forget the entire world; so she did, and she just watched the woman she was almost positive she’d loved since childhood, in her most unguarded, most intimate and honest moment.

Lexa let a few tears roll freely down her cheeks, not caring if it was cheesy or cliched; she’d never seen anything more beautiful in her life than Clarke's crisis; than her perfect body arching and rolling, unashamed of her own need. Lexa laid there quietly, watching Clarke as she panted and sighed her way into the afterglow. She felt extraordinarily lucky; she felt even luckier as Clarke’s entire body settled with a sated sigh, and Lexa realized she was already half asleep, right there in her own pile of debris. That's how thoroughly fucked she was, and Lexa felt somewhat proud that she'd been able to reduce Clarke to a sleepy, sticky mess.

“This isn’t very comfortable.. Do you want to move?” Lexa whispered, reluctant to ask; but it seemed unnecessary to fall asleep on the uncomfortable pile when they had two perfectly good beds. Or even a perfectly good floor, with plenty of other spots that lacked the spread of spilled photo albums; the collection of CD cases that seemed to have movie DVDs in them; what looked like an old prom dress; and a battered hockey stick that had found their way beneath them.

“Never,” Clarke mumbled into a shoe, her face resting on a purple sweater and half the button-fly closure of a pair of her jeans. The buttons had already begun to mark her face, but Clarke seemed fairly serious about not moving, and just continued panting lightly into the shoe.

“I do not believe that at all,” Lexa chuckled, leaning over to kiss the back of her shoulder. “Not when you tell me that with your face in a sneaker, anyway.” She sighed reluctantly, fingering a few loose tendrils of Clarke’s hair. “We should move to the bed to sleep, if we want to be able to walk tomorrow, you know. And why do you have a hockey stick with you, exactly?”

“Walking is overrated,” Clarke made a displeasured noise. “And it’s just in case I need a hockey stick. I think my sheets are still in the bin I forgot about, down in the lobby. They might be all that’s left by now.”

“We could go get your stuff,” Lexa offered, getting only a sleepy snarl from Clarke in return as she wiggled tighter against her, clearly not a fan of the idea. “And when have you _ever_ found yourself in need of an emergency hockey stick?”

“You never know,” Clarke grunted.

Lexa chuckled, resting her chin lightly on her shoulder and nipping playfully at her earlobe. “I don’t have an emergency hockey stick, but my sheets are already on my bed, you know. We could go christen those for awhile..”

Lexa smiled suggestively as she tugged Clarke over onto her back, gazing into her eyes and leaning over her slowly. Clarke inhaled sharply as Lexa’s body pressed against hers before she carefully peeled a sock off Clarke’s side and tossed it away with an amused look.

Clarke groaned lightly. “I’m such a hot mess.”

“You are _very_ hot,” Lexa admitted, kissing the curve of her her jaw and easily mumbling, “And very messy. And I really, really, like your mess.” She bent nearly in half to kiss the tip of her nose, and Clarke’s lips curved upward, her eyes sparkling playfully.

“Let’s go to your bed, then. We can find out together just how messy I can get you.” Clarke ran her finger over Lexa’s folds slowly, pointedly; teasing some of the copious wetness from between her parted lips, making Lexa shudder with a soft moan.

“Can’t promise you’ll still be able to walk tomorrow, of course,” Clarke continued her suggestive offer, her tone seeming to indicate that she had nothing but the purest intentions. Her sultry eyes and the fact that she was sucking her finger in the most filthy way possible just then, however, suggested very much otherwise. Lexa visibly and audibly gulped as she quickly pushed herself up on trembling legs.

♾

They fell to Lexa’s mattress already intimately entwined. Clarke pressed Lexa back between increasingly sloppy kisses and slid her hand between them, dipping a finger into her parted folds briefly, prodding Lexa’s clit gently; far too gently to satisfy anything, rather it just stoked the fire burning in her gut and made her keen with a needful whine.

Clarke, unable to bring herself to tease her any further, shimmied her knees down a few inches and tucked her hands under the backs of Lexa’s thighs. Her fingertips left soft red marks in Lexa’s flesh as Clarke tugged upwards. After a moment of confusion, Lexa figured out what Clarke was trying to achieve, and drew her knees up on either side of her.

Granted better cooperation, Clarke continued to pull Lexa’s legs up, guiding one around her own shoulder and back. Lexa bit her lip and shuddered in anticipation as Clarke pressed her other leg upwards, opening Lexa fully to her mouth. She was nearly delirious with craving when she gave Lexa a sly, sinful, almost predatory grin and promptly ducked her head between Lexa’s widely spread thighs.

Clarke gave her clit a soft brush with her lips, and Lexa cried out. Her leg snapped against Clarke’s back, curling easily around the curve of her spine as Clarke held her other leg immobile and pressed back tightly to her abdomen. Lexa’s toes flexed, her limited motion reducing her to a squirming mess, completely at Clarke’s mercy in an instant.

Clarke’s tongue must have been blessed, or maybe cursed; her practiced movements made it seem like she’d spent her life training for this particular task. She unabashedly sought out every curve and divot her tongue could reach without the slightest of hesitations; she made no effort to hide how much she was enjoying herself as she lapped up every drop of Lexa she could locate, which was spurring Lexa on just as much as it was herself.

Lexa’s arms reached out, cupping the sides of Clarke’s head and grabbing it tightly, unabashedly riding Clarke's face as her hips bucked and her body jerked. Lexa came quickly, and with a slight gasp of surprise, though it wasn't a large orgasm, nor an entirely unexpected one. Clarke paused, watching Lexa’ swollen clit pulsing wildly as her body arched with a light but sharp cry.

Lexa’s nails dug into her scalp as she whined Clarke's name on a desperate breath and tightened her grip. She wasn’t done, which was good; Clarke was far from done herself. 

Determined to map out as much of her pleasure as possible for later use, Clarke took one of Lexa’s limp hands and placed it on her own thigh, silently but clearly assigning Lexa the task of keeping her own leg out of the way. Lexa was panting heavily, mewling Clarke’s name in the back of her throat as her body strained for more.

Clarke had plenty to give. Two fingers slid easily through Lexa’s clenching entrance, and she was so wet that Clarke’s third finger met little resistance as it joined the others.

Lexa was gasping her name now, and Clarke wondered what it would take to make her scream. Determined to find out, she teased her tongue against her clit again, nudging the straining bud’s root, just slightly left of center. Lexa let out a yelp and unintentionally slammed her heel into Clarke’s back, hard enough to bruise.

Lexa strained to grunt an apology, but Clarke had a wicked grin on her face and imagined she would come to treasure the bruise; it was marked proof that she’d found what she sought. She swiped the tip of her tongue slowly over the left side of the little red bud, testing; teasing.

Lexa shuddered so hard, her teeth clacked together, and her leg slid, forgotten, from her hand as she gripped the mattress for dear life. Clarke hummed softly as she continued moving her fingers easily through the slick mess that—to be fair—she had warned Lexa she would turn her into; she was pleased to have made good on her promise.

Lexa was mindlessly chanting Clarke’s name in single syllable bursts, her hips bucking wildly as she pulled her sheets loose with her grip. Every well-developed muscle in her was strained to its limits, and as Clarke gently prodded the spot once more with a devilish smile, a tear ran down Lexa’s cheek and she let out a guttural, pleading whine.

She was ready. Clarke wrapped her lips around her straining clit and gave it a gentle suck as she roughly dragged her tongue over the same spot. Lexa’s body rippled and undulated violently, and she cried Clarke’s name loudly enough to alert half their floor to the fact that she was coming; and it was far harder and lasted longer than the first time.

Lexa shuddered repeatedly, her inner walls clamping tightly around Clarke’s slowing fingers as she burst out of control and soared through the atmosphere. She was so far gone, she began to panic as the thrumming deep inside her roiling gut reached its highest peak and dropped her unceremoniously over the edge of it. Lexa fell forever, gasping Clarke's name because it was all she could remember in the moment; she'd forgotten everything else. Her arms and legs flailed as they reached for something to help her defy gravity before she crashed. The anxiety thumped through her tensed, cramping body, and finally her eyes found Clarke's and locked on, and her fear of forgetting faded fast. 

Lexa floated safely, gently, calmly back to the bed, back to her body, which was now completely drained of everything she'd had. The churning tide—which had brought her disoriented, blissful, enchanting but explosive panic to the shore and dumped it with all the ferocity her anxiety could generate—it washed back out, its sparkling blue as peaceful and pale as Clarke's eyes.

Lexa had come, and hard, plenty of times in her life by then—or rather, she'd _thought_ she'd come fairly hard, but now she questioned it. She'd never before felt the waves of panic that churned in her at the sudden and complete loss of control that Clarke had achieved in her now-listless body; nor had she ever felt so relieved and reassured by simply capturing someone's eye. She'd been flung from the highest peak she could have imagined, and then, when the fall had filled her with fear, Clarke had held on tightly. Clarke had given and then soothed her through the most intense pleasure she'd ever experienced, and Lexa couldn't help sniffling as several of her cathartic tears fell to the loose sheet beneath them.

Lexa had _never_ screamed before.

Clarke slowly withdrew her fingers, running her tongue over Lexa’s still-pulsing folds, gently cleaning her with a reverent tongue. She was careful not to overstimulate, and Lexa moaned softly in appreciation as her limp body collapsed on the bed, her legs falling apart as Clarke soothed her fevered flesh. When Lexa whimpered softly, Clarke abandoned her post, sliding up Lexa’s body and kissing her softly as they floated together into the aftermath of their mutual devastation.

"Are you okay?" Clarke asked gently, her fingertips gently brushing the tears lovingly from Lexa's cheeks. Lexa just nodded; she'd lost the power of coherent speech, far too drawn out of her head by the intensity and, frankly, the mere existence of, her second orgasm, to be verbal just yet. Clarke gently kissed each set of dripping eyelashes as they fluttered closed. Lexa breathed out softly and let herself settle onto her side, curling her long legs up and in, towards her chest. Clarke shifted around for a moment, careful to put some distance between herself and Lexa's overstimulated, twitching flesh.

"Swear you're okay?" Clarke was concerned at Lexa's lack of verbosity, and Lexa thought a bit deliriously that she wanted to make that sound disappear, but couldn't think of which words would achieve that. 

Instead, she turned her head just a little, giving Clarke a dreamy, drugged smile as she settled beside her.

“Wow.” It was all Lexa could manage, but it seemed to do the trick, because Clarke relaxed, and mild relief washed the concern off her face. Lexa felt vaguely proud that she'd managed to do that, particularly when her brain seemed to be on an impromptu vacation at the moment. Lexa honestly didn't think she could do anything. She felt stoned; sated and sleepy, and deeply satisfied. She couldn't think about anything besides Clarke and the sluggish feeling of relief that was filling her. 

“I’ve wanted to do that for a long time. You taste even better than in my dreams," she finally admitted softly. "Also a pretty high bar."

The response was coy, verging on shy; but laced with an obscene tone that nearly made Lexa whimper. If she had been able to move any of her tired muscles, Lexa would have reached to make love with Clarke again a hundred more times that night; soreness and exhaustion be damned. 

Clarke could tell Lexa blushed deeply then, too, despite her face already being red. She couldn't help it; she was in awe of Lexa. She was also vaguely worried it was just another feverish wet dream she was having; that she'd wake up alone in sweats with a tattered reminder of her most missed connection knotted onto her wrist. She was proud that she'd destroyed Lexa so thoroughly that she could barely speak, and she felt brave as her eyes scanned the intricate lines of Lexa's tattoos.

“Was worth waiting for,” Lexa mumbled sleepily, curling up a bit on her side, her lashes fluttering closed once more.

“So were you, Lexa,” Clarke whispered, gently smoothing her hair off her face before kissing her tearstained, tiredly smiling cheek.

Clarke settled on the de-sheeted bed, finding it impossible to care about anything but the steady cadence of Lexa’s heartbeat and the soft, satisfied breaths that echoed from the tattooed back she faced. She gently traced her middle finger over the extraordinarily beautiful geometric design that spanned from the infinity symbol at the base of her neck, to just above the small dimple in her smooth lower back that crowned the center of her curved ass.

“You know, we—“

“Shhhhh,” Lexa hushed her, a satisfied smile on her lips. She didn’t move a centimeter otherwise. Whatever Clarke had to say was instantly lost to the whisper of a contented sigh; a breath across neck, jaw, and cheek as she obediently shushed, smiling affectionately at the back of Lexa’s head and resting her own just beside it. 

They rested quietly with their eyes closed, their hearts still thrumming out a lazily calm cadence in the wake of their exhaustive lovemaking. It was cool enough with the cracked window that Clarke’s bare skin was covered in pinprick goosebumps, but she decided that she didn’t want a blanket badly enough to disturb Lexa intentionally; especially since Lexa didn’t seem cold. Her flesh was still warm enough that Clarke could feel the radiated heat she was emitting, and found herself repeatedly and unintentionally shifting closer, trying to absorb some of it.

Lexa remained vaguely restless despite her clear exhaustion. She’d begun to doze off several times before shifting herself awake, and she just couldn't seem to get comfortable. Clarke shifted closer to the edge of the bed, trying to make more room as Lexa shifted and sighed her way across the short expanse of the narrow bed to Clarke's radius once more. Clarke was dangerously close to running out of bed under her ass, and she hummed reluctantly.

"I can go sleep in my own bed, if this bugs you. These beds are kind of ridiculously small." Clarke's voice was a gentle breezy whisper, her lips brushing the shell of Lexa’s ear lightly and softening the suggestion for both their benefits. She didn’t want to leave, but she couldn’t watch Lexa toss and turn uncomfortably, either.

Lexa didn't reply, however; instead, she sat and tugged a blanket from the foot of the bed; one which hada very familiar silver-grey stone, with a familiar curling blue infinity symbol on it. Clarke smiled, blinking as her eyes threatened to start welling once more. She found it just a little harder to push it back down when Lexa twisted briefly and leaned over to tuck the edge of it around and just under Clarke's back. She then nestled her own back snugly against Clarke's soft, warm belly, tugging the knitted quilt tightly around them and settling her ass into the cradle of Clarke’s hips.

Lexa let out a slow exhale, her body sinking against Clarke's completely. She had a sated smile on her lips, and her lashes fluttered closed as she grew limp in Clarke's comforting embrace, murmuring sleepily, "You'll never bug me, Clarke."

Clarke exhaled softly and relaxed her weight against Lexa's back, sniffling quietly in cadence with the handful of tears now threatening to escape her lashes. Clarke placed soft kisses along the figure eight on the back of her neck and rubbed her stomach lazily, tracing invisible drawings into Lexa's still-flushing, heated flesh. After a minute or two, she gently clasped her teeth around Lexa's earlobe, giving it a playful tug before whispering into the shell of it with a drunken smile and misty eyes.

"Did you just tuck us in?"

"Mhm," Lexa replied dreamily, her head tucking beneath Clarke's chin. "Feels safe, remember?"

"I don't have to remember. I feel that way now, Sir Lexa."

"Me, too, Sir Clarke. Now shhhhh."

Clarke smiled and laid a soft kiss on Lexa's head before burying her face in the familiar, unruly nest; swearing she could smell the end of summer lacing through it, wound in the gentle whisper of a new beginning.

_Say that you'll stay, forever this way  
_ _Forever and forever, that we'll never have to change  
_ _Don’t move, don’t breathe, don’t change, don’t leave  
_ _And promise me, say you'll stay, we’ll stay this way_

_\- Jewel, “This Way”_

__

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still sorry it was late & out of order. Hope it was worth the wait. :)  
> Have a safe weekend ~ take care of yourselves.  
> Be well, be kind, _ste yuj_.  
>  _[be strong.]_  
>  ~ PG


End file.
